3 








i^ 



±^IS^ 



Montana 







A MOX'PAXA FARM (LO(;) COTTAGE. COOL IN SUMJVIEK, WARM IX WINTER. 
NEAT. DURABLE AND HOME-MADE. 



S. M. EMERY, 

Direclor 
MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



Fpee Land 

Fertile Soil 
Sure Crops 



There is a beautiful and fertile valley in 
Montana 200 miles long and three to six 
miles wide. Stock does splendidly. The blue- 
joint hay is the richest on earth. Wheat, 
oats, barley and roots give big crops and 
never fail. Coal can be had for the hauling. 
You can get homestead land, 160 acres p'ree. 
You can get another 160 acres for 25 cents an 
acre cash and $1.00 per acre after four years. 
The finest railway in America runs through 
the valley with four passenger and several 
freiglit trains every day. Don't spend your 
life renting high-priced Eastern land. Montana 
will make you rich and independent. Copies 
of letters written by men who live there, also 
full information, railway rates, maps, etc., sent 
on application by Max Bass, 220 So. Clark 
Street, Chicago, or W. M. Wooldridge, U. S. 
Commissioner, Hinsdale (Valley Co.), Montana. 



Send this Bulk-tin on to your Eastern (rionds who :ire Icxikinir (or new locations. 



>» ^ 



BULLETIN No. 26 



THE MONTANA 



EXPERIMENT STATION 



MONTANA AGRICULTURALLY CONSIDERED 



S. M. EMERY, Director 

II 



BOZEMAX, MONTANA, 
Mav, U)(I0. 



5 



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^ ^ BULLETIN NO. 26. 
^ ^ _ 



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INTRODUCTORY 



The great transcontinental lines, the Northern Pacific and the 
Great Northern, parallel each other irregularly, passing through thi? 
state from east to west, and averaging perhaps three hundred miles 
apart. Travel is heavy on these lines, and the cars are crowded v,ith 
new faces; passengers en route for the great West. 

Sound the occupants of these railway coaches, and you will find 
that the majority of them are bound for Washington, Oregon and the 
North Alaska gold fields. It is a comparatively rare occurrence to find 
a stranger whose destination is Montana and it is a proper question to 
inquire as to why this is so. 

Ignorance of conditions prevailing in the state, together with a 
lack of concerted action on the part of those who have most powerful 
influences on immigration are no doubt responsible in large measure for 
the lack of Montana-bound immigrants. 

The writer claims to be fairly well posted as to Northwestern con- 
ditions; was for tv/enty-five years a resident of Minnesota, and remembers 
a clearly cut episode, together with well written, descriptive articles, 
with which the Eastern press— notably that of Minnesota — was filled 
concerning the severity of the winter of '86. These described the 
terrible loss among the flocks and herds of Montana; that the park 
travel ceased in September, and I acknowledge with shame that a 
projected winter business trip from Eastern Minnesota to Western 
Montana in '85 was postponed for fear of the disagreeable possibilities 
that might ensue. And so no doubt it is with others. They glance 
at the maps, note the fact that Montana's northern boundary is for 
nearly six hundred miles the great boundary line between Canada and 
the United States, and instinctively shiver at the idea of wintering in 
such a boreal zone. 

Alluring descriptions are given of the charms of the tide-water 
countries beyond, of the matchless fruits and flowers, of the moisture- 
laden atmosphere; and per contra there are dire accounts of the 
hardships and privations of the country where irrigation is necessary 
in order that the conduct of farm operations may reach a successful 
issue. 

Such reasons are good and sufficient; they cause settlers to move 
on. and if not, that railv/ay official never existed, and never will, who, 
all things being equal, would not prefer to secure the long haul to 
the short one. This is where the great corporations have made the 
mistake of their lives; for given the ordinary railway passenger fam- 
ily of five souls coming West, say on three tickets, where from $75 to 
$120 is received for hauling them to their destination; such a family 
will represent a tonnage of at least three car loads of farm products 



6 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

per year In any country, and if farming the fertile soil of Montana, the 
annual yield will easily double such an output. A child will know 
that Montana's local consumption will never be equal to her productive 
capacity, once its broad, generous acres are all tilled ; a market for her 
surplus must be found at tide water, either East or West, and Mon- 
tana being farthest removed from the ocean boundaries of the United 
States has the longest relative haul of any of the states traversed by 
these lines; hence a ton of Montana freight is worth more to com- 
mon carriers than a ton produced elsewhere. 

The uninformed traveler in traversing MontPona on either of these 
great thoroughfares carries with him from the state exceedingly hazy 
and unreliable impressions. Coming over either route he is half way 
across the state before striking the mountains or the richest valleys — 
those which to date have been the best improved. 

In coming to Montana, he passes the dry uplands of North Dakota, 
for the most part unfilled; and finding much the same conditions in 
Montana (the line between North Dakota and Montana being im- 
aginary rather than geographic), and having likewise been well 
educated in the severity of Dakota winters, he imagines that the 
sage brush plains, the sparsely grassed plateaus, the long reaches of 
naked, apparently barren intervals, populated only by straggling bands 
of horses, or sheep, are to be classed in the same category with Da- 
kota. He is not advised that after crossing the state line and 
progressing westward that every mile covered toward the setting sun 
brings him nearer better conditions, and that once within fifty or 
sixty miles of the great mountain ranges he begins to encounter the 
land of the chinook. 

In this land the burden of the prayer of the stockmen and farmer 
is for more snow. This for the double purpose of supplying a sub- 
stitute for drink to the herds and moisture for the succeeding crops. 

Chinook winds are peculiar. One versed in mountain climatology 
recognizes as their percursor, a state of atmosphere, which brings the 
timbered mountains out in bold distinctness and paints the deep rich 
green of the conifer growth to a blue black; soon the wind springs up; 
it may come from the northwest, the west or the southwest, but it chills 
to the marrov/, and the novice would scout at the idea that these 
gigantic Pacific trade winds, moisture laden, apparently, and freezing 
in temperature, would lick up as with a consuming tongue every 
vestige of snow upon which it could get direct action. 

The writer once retired at night, when the surrounding country 
was covered with eight inches of dry, powdery snow (in the holiday 
week) ; the wind roared all night, and in the morning one could not 
have found the material for a snow ball, save in some sheltered cove, 
where the wind could not get full action; in the surrounding country 
a dog could not have assuaged his thirst had he been dependent upon 
the standing pools of moisture naturally to be expected under the 
existing circumstances. Such is a startling phenomenon and is in 
large part responsible for the mildness of the usual Montana winter. 

In the winter of '92 and '93, a father and son, natives of Massa- 
chusetts, were located in Jacksonville, Fla., and Helena, Mont., re- 
spectively. They were of a scientific turn of mind, and studied 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 



weather conditions very closely. In the spring, upon comparing notes 
they found that the weather in Montana, taking the winter as a whole 
(except two weeks of exceptionally severe winter weather in Feb- 
ruary), was milder than that of .Jacksonville, Fla. 

Montana v.inters will average much milder than will any of the 
states lying north of the Ohio river. 

It is this salubrity of climate that makes of the ranges of the 
state ideal grazing grounds, especially since in later years unnatural 
contingencies are discounted by putting up a supply of hay equal 
to one-half to three-fourths tons of hay per animal of cow kind, and 
the fortieth part of a ton for sheep. This is not required so much 
on account of the depth of the snow or the coldness of the season, as 
it is in the event of a crusting over of the snow, occasioned by a half- 
hearted Chinook, followed by a sudden snap of cold weather. 

Food is seldom provided for range horses, as they can paw 
through any ordinary condition of snow or crust to the short, nutritious 
grasses with which the winter ranges are carpeted. 

The novice in passing from Minnesota to the states westward of 
Montana will doubtless be impressed with the much greater luxuriance 
of vegetation to be found in Western Minnesota or Central Dakota. 
He may unwisely jump at the conclusion that the former states supply 
better stock range regions than Montana, whose vegetation, save in 
exceptional seasons, seldom attains a greater height than from six 
to tv.^elve inches (this applies to the best forage grasses, and not to 
the rank herbage bordering the water courses). A brief reference to 
prevailing conditions may not be amiss. Montana grass is made by 
winter snows, supplemented by April, May and June showers. By the 
latter part of June or the third week in July, the best grasses have 
fully matured and all growth ceases. The spring rains cease only in 
exceptional seasons by the 20th of June, the surface of the ground rap- 
idly loses its supply of moisture by evaporation, the grasses turn 
sere and yellow, and by August the fire would run in the wind if 
the torch were applied to the grass. 

It is more than likely that upon these natural sun-cured meadows 
not a drop of moisture will fall for the balance of the year. 
About November 15th, a sharp change of temperature will be ex- 
perienced, and a light fall of snow follow the rise in temperature. 
This remains for a few days and then disappears, winter in dead 
earnest not coming until from the 15th of December to the 15th of 
February, so that the dry, sun-cured herbage, fully matured, much of 
it carrying a full crop of fruit (grass seed), meets with no moisture, 
that is so fatal to the Dakota or Minnesota fall pastures. Much rain 
in the fall will rot, or render unpalatable and unnutritious the stand- 
ing forage, in exactly the same way it would tame grass in the cock. 
It becomes saturated, and the days at that season of the year do not 
give sufficient light and warmth to dry them out and arrest decay. 
So it is that the grama, or bunch grass, of the great cattle and sheep 
ranges of Montana will not only sustain life, but will fatten animals 
to such an extent as the tame meadows of the Eastern states cannot do. 
It is the invariable experience of the Western breeders that the range 
cattle taken off the upland natural meadows of Montana always lose 



8 MONTANA EXPERIMENTAL STATION. 



in weight after transfer from their natural habitat to the Eastern 
stock yards, where timothy hay (good according to their lights) is the 
staple food. 

Nor is it only a question of climatic conditions governing the 
development of harvesting, so to speak, of these wild meadov/ crops. 
Chemical analyses reveal a marked difference in the food value of 
the forage and cereal crops. The natural fertility of the soil manifests 
itself by charging crops there grown v,'ith much higher nutritive val- 
ues, and if the growing season of the low, clustering grasses were 
amplified by seasonable rains, occurring simultaneously with the 
customary snow of the state named, the rankness of the herbage of 
Montana would be co-equal with that of the states. 

It is simply a case of arrested development in which nature makes 
lup for diminished quantity by adding quality. 

A WORD AS TO IRRIGATION. 

The writer is of the opinion that if the tillable area of Montana 
•(and this area is one of immensity, the state containing 145,800 square 
miles, about equally distributed between mountains, grazing and till- 
able lands), in round numbers about 50,000 square miles (or 32,000,000 
acres), were plowed to a depth of 12 inches, the soil perfectly pulver- 
ized and this land summer fallowed each alternate season, that with- 
out a drop of water being artificially applied to the surface of the earth, 
and the same care taken in fitting the soil for the reception of seeds 
that is practiced in older states, that one year with another, the thirty- 
two million acres thus tilled would yield better average crops for ten, 
twenty or a hundred years, than would the same areas in Dakota and 
Minnesota. 

In round numbers, the rainfall of the state averages eighteen 
inches, or fifty per cent more than is required for successful crop pro- 
duction, if applied in the proper season. 

No doubt there would be years when the harvested crop would 
not return the seed sown, but on the other hand these years would 
be offset by crops yielding twice or three fold the average of Eastern 
i3rops. 

In proof of this assertion the whea,t (fife) crops of Hon. Paris Gib- 
son, of Great Falls, have from the period from 1890 to 1900 averaged 
twenty-nine bushels to the acre grown without irrigation. 

Then you inquire, why irrigate? Simply as a crop insurance. The 
premium you pay being so infinitessimally small (about $1 per acre 
each season), in comparison with the gross returns, that one can well 
afford to provide water for growing crops. No matter how intense the 
prejudice of the stranger may be to this method of farming, after an 
experience of a year or two in growing crops under irrigation, you 
may be certain that thereafter he will always be an earnest advocate 
and promoter of irrigation. 

Estimating 32,000,000 acres of land in the state as being suscep- 
tible of tillage, what per cent of this can be irrigated? Reliable infor- 
mation puts it at twelve million acres. Twelve million acres of Mon- 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 



tana irrigated lands means a production equal to that of from twenty- 
four to thirty-six million humid acres, simply that these lands produce 
from two to three fold as much as do the lands of the Union farmed 
without water. The most common error of the Eastern man is to sup- 
pose that given, say eighteen to twenty-four inches of rainfall, often- 
times twice or three times that much, depending upon locality, that 
the results from that are the same as are derived from irrigation. A 
little explanation is said to make the sense clear: First of all, no man 
can tell long beforehand exactly when the rain will fall. If they did, 
crops could be planted so as to coincide with the rains and when 
the most good would be derived. Notable stages, when rains are grate- 
ful to growing crops, are just as they are well out of the ground; warm 
refreshing rains at that period hasten the development to the time 
when the young plant will attain sufficient size to occupy the ground 
and shade it, so that evaporation will be cut off, and the weeds out- 
stripped in their mad race to -the front; again as grain is heading out, 
it needs the impetus of moisture to develop the length of the straw and 
heads. In this connection it is interesting to know that, under irriga- 
tion, grain begins to make rapid growth frequently just as it begins 
to head, and that straw will frequently more than double its size 
after it has begun to force its heads. The time of most benefit to 
grain, in seasonable rains, is as the grain is reaching the following 
three stages: 

First, covering the ground; second, when heading; third, when 
filling; these are the times when water counts in adding to the normal 
grain crop, and it is at these stages that the ranchman or irrigation 
farmer tries to supplement nature. 

On lands at all inclined to be clayey, grain should cover the soil 
before being irrigated or else the sun will rapidly bake the surface. 
A second irrigation should follow the time of heading; this is the 
application that fills the sheaths to the topmost branch of the pan- 
nicies with big, full, plump kernels that outweigh unirrigated grains 
fully twenty per cent. 

There is no intimate relation between the half-bushel measure 
and the standard legal weights in Montana under irrigation; for ex- 
ample, the barley crops of '94 of the Montana Experiment Station 
averaged 55.6 pounds per bushel, against forty-eight pounds legal 
bushel, oats 42.2 pounds to the bushel, against thirty-two pounds, the 
legal bushel, wheat 61.5 pounds to the bushel, against sixty, the legal 
v/eight. These were the average weights of nearly 150 different kinds, 
while there were individual instances of barley weighing 65.5 pounds to 
the bushel, and wheat sixty-one to sixty-two pounds. This is a striking 
difference in favor of irrigated grains. 

Why are results from irrigation different from rainfall? Only 
that this is a case where art is an improvement over nature. 

That r>rea of tilled land cannot be found that does not have natural 
surface drainage, no matter how slight. An inch of rainfall comes 
to the grain field, falls upon a mass of earth occupied with fibrous 
roots, a perfect protection against the ingress of moisture from above, 
and it passes off to the point of least resistance. It is a rare occur- 



10 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



rence to find a grain field so rain-soaked tliat one will sink into the 
soft mud over the shoe-top, and more frequently the wafer has not pen- 
etrated beyond the first two or three inches below the surface. 

The irrigator lays off his fields with a level and starts the water 
from the highest point. He runs laterals (small canals) well guarded 
by damming up the sides, so frequently that when he releases the 
water from the high level, it fiows out and creates a pool or shallow 
lake over the surface of the area between the lateral canal, from 
which he draws his supply, and the next lower lying lateral level, the 
more uneven the land the more frequent the ditches or laterals. 

This water is applied not at the rate of one, two or three inches 
of surface water, but from six to eight inches in depth. It is held there 
until the soil is not only moistened, but literally soaked to a depth of 
twelve to sixteen inches. It is this super-saturation that dissolves 
and renders available fertilizers and mineral constituents present In 
the soil, that are unavailable to the plant that does not have 
this great help to the digestion of its food. Given natural moisture 
to germinate the seed grain and to give it six inches growth, which 
is present nine years out of ten, and two such soakings as these de- 
scribed, at the critical time in the life of the plant, and small wonder 
that Montana yields are so abnormally large, and that the relator is 
near in kin in the Eastern mind to a romancer. 

What is the cost of this munificent benefaction to the agricultur- 
ist? Montana can be supplied with ditches to twelve million acres of 
land at a cost of about $7 per acre. 

After the ditches are provided, fields can be fitted to be irrigated 
at about twenty cents per acre for laterals, dams, etc., 
though the crop and the irrigation proper will cost a trifle over $1 per 
acre to apply. Understand, please, that the $7 is a fixed permanent 
charge, which, once established properly, will last for generations, 
and the $1.20 per acre is the regular annual charge. How far would 
this $8.20. expended annually, go toward keeping up the fertility of 
Eastern land, once you begin to apply barnyard fertilizer. 

It is hard to assume that, were the lands of the Dakotas and Min- 
nesota as intelligently watered (and much of it could be), that they 
would not be as productive, but we question if they would. Nature 
is credited with having made the mountain region the last of all, and 
we are guilty of no blasphemy in assuming that the mistakes of the 
anterior creation were revised and corrected in the case of her last 
work. Certain it is that chemical analyses show from one-third to 
one-half more phosphoric acid and potash in the average of the soils 
of Montana than are to be found in an average of the soils of the 
United States, including that of Montana, and this superior richness 
of mineral contents, coupled with the facilities for rendering them 
available, are what do the business. 

Powerful factors in vegetable production are light, heat and moist- 
ure. Think of the aids to growth to be found in a climate, where 
good eyes can read newspaper print nineteen hours per day, as is the 
case in Montana in the early days of July. Think, too, of the rarefied 
air in an altitude of more than 3,000 feet above sea level, and how 
forceful is the effect of the sun's rays with so little to obstruct or 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 



11 




12 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

hinder them. No wonder that Jack's bean stalk is duplicated in every 
well-tilled Montana field. 

The transcontinental traveler after leaving St. Paul sets back 
his watch twice; an hour each time, between St. Paul and the 
western border of Montana. This means that he is then 1,400 miles 
nearer the setting sun than at St. Paul, or that when the sun is touch- 
ing the western horizon at St. Paul, that it is two hours high over the 
better part of Montana. Two hours of the evening sun is a much 
greater stimulant to vegetation than two hours of morning sun. The 
evening sun finds the earth receptive to the sun's rays, while the 
inertia of nature, so to speak, occasioned by the paralyzing effects 
of the night chill, has to be overcome before growth is resumed. This 
is in favor of Montana's vegetation and explains the greater develop- 
ment of plant life. Montana clover and alfalfa growers harvest three 
crops easier than the farmers of Minnesota can secure two. The 
lowan, the Nebraskan, the South Minnesotan attune their harps to the 
one strain, "Corn is King;" we of Montana make sweeter, more en- 
trancing strains of divine harmony in sounding the praises of the 
clovers. Montana is essentially a clover state and in no other place 
do the legumes thrive as they do here. Little matter what kind is 
tried, medium, mammoth, alsike, white alfalfa, esparcette, sanfoin and 
vetches, all these lupines are prize winners when given an opportunity. 

Did you ever think of making a comparison between the cost of an 
acre of corn and an acre of clover? The Montanan elects to grow an 
acre of barley; he fits his land in fine shape, seeds it (and the Mon- 
tanan who irrigates is among the best farmers of the land), and as an 
after-thought elects to sow a barley field to clover, he broadcasts seed 
at the rate of seven pounds to the acre, costing $1, about, for seed. 
It is irrigated twice to make a fine barley crop. That fall he finds a 
magnificent aftermath on his grain stubble worth two or three times 
the cost of the seed for fall pasture, so that it practically enters the 
harvest year on the same footing as to cost with the unsov/n acre of 
corn. The clover field will cost $1 per acre for two irrigations and can 
be contracted to be put into stack (less thirty cents an acre for mow- 
ing) for ninety cents; the total cost of an acre of clover then would 
be $2.20. The yield of hay will be from two and one-half to four 
tons per acre, worth $6 per ton, or from $15 to $24 per acre for a crop 
that costs $2.20. On the other hand, the acre of corn cannot be pro- 
duced for anything like $2.20. The yield will be, say thirty bushels, 
which brings five to ten dollars, depending upon the whims of the 
stock feeders. The Montana farmer will produce as many pounds of 
as good beef or mutton from the acre of clover as will the Eastern 
farmer from the acre of corn, there being about five times the tonnage. 
Then, too, the clover field is in fine trim for a grain crop, and can be 
broken and fitted for seeding much deeper than can the corn field. 

Experiments at the Montana station have established the fact that 
it is not profitable to combine grain with clover in livestock feeding, 
at least but a very small amount of grain has proved to be profitable. 
This may seem incredible to the feed<,r of Eastern clover, but Eastern 
growers never open clover stacks out of which may be taken hay, 
whose color is almost as vivid both as to stalk, blade and bloom as 



BULLETIN NO. 21. 13 

when it was mown. It stands to reason that hay that is cured without 
material change other than a removal of a part of the moisture is a 
more valuable food than that which is rendered half rotten in the 
process of curing. Remember, in speaking of haying and hay weather, 
that it is not unusual to have clear skies from hay harvest until the 
advent of winter. 

The process of haying is reduced to a science in parts of Montana. 
In the Yellowstone valley forty tons of alfalfa from the windrow to the 
stack is a day's stint for three men and five horses. In the process 
it never makes the acquaintance of a hay fork nor knows a wagon. 
It is a clear cut case of machinery from start to finish. Small wonder 
that seventy-five cents is accounted reasonable remuneration for trans- 
ferring the crop from the windrow to its resting place, until the bleat- 
ing lambs, driven in from the open range at the advent of winter, 
cause its transfer to the feeding racks and yards. It is then shifted 
from the stacks to yards on ha,y wagons and fed as required. 

Summer fallow has been referred to as an accessory to dry-land 
farming. 






21 'z""ri^'^ir«^-;?-*'^'*^*>*^r^^K^ 




A MONTANA WHEAT FIELD. 

What relation does this sustain to Eastern farming? Fallowing 
land means to permit it to lie fallow, or idle for a season, in a compara- 
tive state of cultivation. It is practiced to a much greater extent than 
is necessary in some of the irrigated sections of the state, though the 
more progressive farmers are rapidly adopting wiser methods. 

Fallowing is almost a necessity to the man owning land in excess 
of his supply of help, teams and machinery; but it is on the bench 
lands and foothills, i. e., lands above the present water supply sources, 
that this system will prove to be most profitable. 

For example, a man in early spring breaks up a piece of sod that 
cannot be irrigated. The process of turning the sod facilitates 
the escape of moisture and, except in phenomenal cases, it would 
practically he impossible to secure a crop thereon the first season. By 
fall the disk and harrow v.ill reduce it to a good mellow state and leave 



14 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

it in a receptive condition for the winter's moisture. Early the following 
spring, perhaps in February or March, he may seed the land to wheat. 
This germinates and starts growth ordinarily before a period at which 
he could begin to plow the lands cropped the previous season. 

The May, June, and possibly the early July rains, stimulate a 
growth that is not surprising if one remembers the nature of the 
soil in which it has been fostered and the latter days of July or the 
first of August find the field ripe for harvest. Possibly conditions may 
be such that he can fall plow and have ready for another crop in the 
early spring or late winter of the succeeding season. Usually the 
land will stand another crop without rest or rotation, but he does not 
attempt three crops in succession on the same land. Rather than 
this, he puts the plow to work after seeding the following spring and 
turns up the soil an inch or two deeper, and in the late summer goes 
on the land with a sixteen-inch disk and the scotch harrow and again 
fits it for a prime crop. Thus he proceeds, fallowing from the alternate 
to the third year, and grows heavy crops therefrom. 

How long can this be maintained, and what figure does the naked 
fallow cut? 

Presumably, the practice is wrong; it is unscientific, wasteful and 
extravagant if one can possibly avoid it, but some of Montana's fields 
have been thus tilled for thirty to thirty-five years, and the end is 
not yet; no manure has been applied either. 

Messrs. Lawes and Gilbert, of Rothamsted, England, have cropped 
continuously and fallowed adjacent fields for more than fifty years to 
wheat, and the variation is too trifling to mention between the annual 
wheat crop totals and the alternate year crop totals. 

If a man is ever justified in fallowing, it is when he has large 
areas and no water. No doubt a better practice than fallowing, if 
moisture were available, would be to seed to rye or any other clover 
crop, expecting to turn it under in early fall. We question, however, 
whether one would be able to superinduce a sufficient growth to war- 
rant this expense and labor. No doubt a crop will be developed that 
will be able to exist with so much moisture and the alternate year's 
use of land conserved. 

Montana farmers have in the field pea a crop which is far and 
away ahead of Indian corn, as an easy money maker for its grov,'er. 
As nutritious a crop as the field pea, which yields from thirty to fifty 
bushels of prime feed at as small an expense as is involved in its pro- 
duction can but be valuable in farm economy; again the straw, after 
the field pea is threshed, is quite as valuable a roughage food as is 
the wild hay of the Dakotas or Minnesota, or even the average run of 
clover, and we have records of the production of this equalling foui" 
tons to the acre. The dairy cow, swine and poultry all appreciate the 
value of the pea as an article of food. 

As to Isltntana's claims in regard to being the home of the cios-er, 
where else can be sown, grown and harvested inside of one hundi'ed 
days one and one-half tons of cured clover to the measured acre. 
This has been repeatedly done at the Montana Experiment Station. 
Think of it, you so-called clover country farmers, who expect to re- 
quire a full season to establish a clover stand, to be pieced and 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 15 



patched out the ensuing year, reseeding the thin spots, and, after 
standing fourteen to fifteen months, to be supremely happy and 
abundantly blessed if you are able to harvest a ton per acre of clover. 
Contrast, and confess that you have never known clover conditions in 
your agr.oulturally starved and stinted lives. 

Scientists will tell you that nitrification of soil must occur (that 
is the bacteria of the clover plant be present in the soil) before the 
clover plant will become established. The writer has seen white clay 
dug from cellars several feet below the surface and hauled as filler? to 
city lots, the surface barely leveled off. white clover seed sown there- 
on, and in ten weeks' time a luxuriant mantle of green spread over 
the clay subsoil. 

Nor is the state a bad corn state. In parts of Montana records 
of ninety bushels of Dent corn, prime in quality, to the acre have been 
made. The only difficulty encountered in parts of the state in its 
culture is that the nights are too cool. Corn is a plant calling for 
continuous hours of warm growing, increasing weather. No country 
in which folk can be comfortable at night under a pair of blankets in 
the midst of summer is adapted to this crop; this condition is the case 
always after one passes the 4,000 feet point of altitude. Flint corn can, 
however, be grown quite successfully in the majority of the higher val- 
leys. It is too easy, however, to produce such abundant yields of 
wheat, barley, oats and peas as sown crops to lose sleep over an ap- 
parent inability to cope with other sections in corn culture as a hoed 
crop. 

THE HEALTH OF MONTANA. 

On a westbound train, recently, I encountered a family en route 
from Missouri to the Yakima valley, Washington. Father, mother and 
six children, from the babe in arms to the sturdy stripling, able to 
hold a plow or do his share of farm labor. They were keenly alive to 
all that was new to one from a prairie state visiting the mountains for 
the first time. It was a study in human nature to note the effect that 
the ever-changing panorama had upon them. They intelligently di- 
vided the party on either side of the train and the approach of any- 
thing new was the signal to have the others come trooping across 
to enjoy the fresh novelty. The family was more than an ordinarily 
intelligent one, and never did they manifest their intelligence to better 
advantage than when they left Kansas for the cool, bracing North- 
west. Each and every one, from father to the nursing babe, was satur- 
ated with malaria. Their complexions were as dark as that of a newly 
arrived Chinese; the flesh on their faces was shrunken and hide- 
bound; stomachs distended, and vhile a close examination was not 
made, no doubt they would have shown a scarcity of finger and toe 
nails shaken off by the numerous attacks of chills and fever. Finally 
the mother remarked : "Oh, if I could only have a drink of the good 
Kansas water." As the words were spoken, I glanced out of the window 
at a swiftly-flowing trout stream, clear as crystal and as pure as un- 
filtered water ever becomes on earth. On either hand of the narrow 



16 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

canyon, through which the road ran, the mountains towered into the 
clear depths of ether until it was difficult from the train to locate their 
summits. I looked to see the mountains roll over and crush one so 
ignorant of what was good, wholesome and palatable. Likely never 
before had her eyes encountered so pure a fluid, but the poor soul was 
longing for the flesh pots of Egypt, and was sincere in the thought 
that the sweetly alkaline water of Kansas, to which she had been ac- 
customed all her life, was good, and the clear, cold aqua pura of the 
mountains was not palatable, simply that it was tasteless in its purity. 

This expression of the homesick plains-woman started a chain 
of thought as to what health accessories were, and as to whether we 
of the mountains possessed them in a reasonable degree. 

Two great factors affecting the health for good or ill, are the 
air v/e breathe and the water we drink. It is reasonable to suppose 
that the loftier the elevation at which we are placed, the greater 
freedom from pestilential odors and vapors, to say nothing of disease- 
breeding germs to be encountered in greater numbers at the low-lying 
levels. This is simply a question of the law of gravity. Air flows down 
hill the same as water does, carrying with it impure particles heavier 
than itself, much the same as driftwood is carried along in the water 
current. Again we know that the higher, dryer altitudes are desirable 
for those afflicted with pulmonary or tuberculous trouble. The why 
of this, once understood, is simple. That lungs and trachea are bene- 
fited by pure air is that their linings are inflamed, and that they 
heal only as they are supplied with an atmosphere free from irritat- 
ing elements. Remove the cause of disease and nature speedily recti- 
fies our mistakes. So well understood is this principle that Colorado 
and California, the one possessing the purity afforded by altitude and 
the other that from heat, transmitted from the deserts bordering her 
on the one hand, and the free breezes of the ocean on the other, are 
today half populated by folk or their descendants forced thither, in 
order that they might escape the death penalty incurred by long resi- 
dence in lung-destroying climates. 

So alarming is the influx of tuberculosis that both of these great 
natural sanitariums are agitating or have already passed laws look- 
ing to the prevention of residence of those thus diseased. 

With no disposition to advertise Montana as a cure for consump- 
tives, and no desire to add to her population a single pest-ridden vic- 
tim (for consumption is certainly contagious), we do have the right to 
state that the death rate from this dread disease is the smallest of any 
;state in the Union, notwithstanding the fact that a large per cent of 
iher labor population suffer more exposure to the elements in the ordi- 
nary transaction for business, than do those of any other state. Think 
of her thousands and tens of thousands, who labor daily hundreds of 
feet below the surface in damp mines; of the thousands of stockmen, 
who are exposed to every change of weather, in giving stock their at- 
tention; of the many who know no habitation the year around, except 
the canvas walls of a tent; and we can but admit there must be an 
exceptional tonic in a climate, that can so reinforce nature as to en- 
able her to withstand exposure that would, of necessity, be fatal if 
encountered at any lower lying levels. 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 



17 



As to the purity of her water; the supply for the city of Bozeman 
(and this is a fair sample of the mountain water of Montana), is takei^ 
from a stream called Lyman creek, a tributary of Bridger creek. It 
is one of the many water courses flowing down and out of the Bridger 
mountains, a low-lying range to the northeast of Bozeman. This 
stream is reservoired some four miles from the city, and the reservoir 
is 280 feet higher than the main portion of the city. The water i» 
conveyed in iron pipes, laid six feet underground from the reservoir. 
At one of the farthest points from the source of supply a chemical 
analysis was made by the Montana Experiment Station, and the fol- 
lowing is the analysis: 

TABLE OF ANALYTICAL RESULTS. 



"Reported in Mgs. per Litre — Parts in 1,000,000. 



No. 


AMMONIA 


CHLORINE 


TOTAL 
SOLIDS 


NITROGEN 

AS 
NITRITES 


NITROGEN 




FREE 


ALB. 


NITKITIE-S 




.02 


.02. 


.00 


406.00 


.«0 


.00" 



PARTS IN ONE MILLION. 



This water is remarkably pure, and there being in a million parts 
biit two-hundredths of 1 per cent of free ammonia and albuminoid am- 
monia, is evidence of its healthfulness. 

"Free Ammonia — This constituent results from the decomposition 
of nitrogenous animal and vegetable matter, and exists in the water 
in the form of a salt of ammonium, from which the ammonia is easily 
set free. The test for ammonia is very delicate, the presence of one 
part of ammonia, in one hundred million parts of water being readily 
detected." 

"This constituent and the following one, are regarded by most 
chemists as the most important upon v.'hich to base an estimate of the 
potability (drink value) of waters. 

"Albuminoid Ammonia. — This represents the nitrogen present in 
the water in the form of nitrogenous animal and vegetable matter 
in a more or less advanced state of decay. The nitrogen is liberated 
from these compounds in the form of ammonia by the action of an 
alkaline solution of potassium permanganate. 

"Nitrogen in Nitrates and Nitrites. — The presence of nitrates and 
nitrites indicates a contamination which occurred sufficiently long ago 
to allow the organic matter, particularly the nitrogen, as indicated by 
the test, to become oxidized. The nitrates represent a more complete 
oxidation than the nitrites, and. under similar conditions, a more re- 
mote source of contamination." 

In 1899 station tests were conducted to determine the amount and 
fertilizing value of organic matter transferred to fields from the 
mountains by irrigation waters. Many samples v.'ere taken and these 



18 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

results averaged. It was supposed that much of the fertility of Mon- 
tana soil and attendant bounteousness of crops came from fertilizing 
matter diffused over the fields by this means. A surface acre foot of 
water (namely the amount of water that would cover an acre to the 
depth of one foot) was considered and the chemical determination 
showed that the money value of the fertilizer thus added was 23 cents 
per acre, estimating the valuable elements of fertilizers at 9 cents to 15 
cents per pound, a liberal amount. It is seen that but a small per cent 
of matter injurious to health is present even in the irrigation waters of 
the state. 

Catarrh, that loathsome disease, so frequently developing into 
consumption, is almost unknown in Montana. Those suffering with it 
on coming here, if exercising due care, entirely recover. Conditions 
are all in favor of longevity, and the physician is the most poorly paid 
of all the professions. Children's contagious diseases are of course 
to be found, but they are usually much milder than are the same 
diseases in a different climate and altitude. 

NATURAL SANITARIUMS. 

Bordering on the southern line of the state and nearly midway 
east and west is the Yellowstone National Park, Nature's "Wonder- 
land." It is not the intent to now speak of this section except to 
refer to the wonderful manifestations there presented, strongly in- 
dicative of a close I'elationship existing between these regions and the 
internal fires that scientists tell us are to be found, once we penetrate 
deeply into the bowels of the earth. Not only is hot water found in this 
park, but could the chemist make his reductions and separate the 
various individual elements there found, no doubt he could supply a 
respectable pharmacopia, so far as an assortment would be necessary. 
Sulphur is especirJly abundant. Nor is this deposition confined to the 
l)ark alone. There are great natural sanitariums, especially useful 
for controlling diseases rheumatic in nature. Boiling springs im- 
pregnated with sulphur and other remedial medicaments occur at 
Hunter's Hot Springs. Park county; in Chico, the same county; White 
Sulphur Springs, Meagher county; Pipe Stone Springs, near White- 
hall, Jefferson county; Boulder Hot Springs. Boulder, Jefferson county, 
and except in the case of Lo Lo Hot Springs, Ravalli county, and of 
tJhico, Park county, there are improvements which for the Western 
country are elaborate; where invalids may be comfortably entertained 
and intelligently treated. Many marvelous cures are related at these 
places, and all have cane and crutch collections that would outfit a 
regiment, left in grateful remembrance of what has been done for 
them by nature and science combined. 

Away up in the headwaters of the north fork of the Sun river, 
close in against the eastern ribs of the range of the Rockies, are hot 
springs of great repute among the Indians, the hunters and the 
trappers who have visited them from time immemorial. So remark- 
able are the curative powers of these waters that men scarcely able 
to mount into vehicles ride over sixty miles of natural roadway and 
live in tents and bathe in the most primitive of accessories in the 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 19 



way of pools and bath houses, invariably returning to civilization as 
good as new. No doubt, as the country opens up, there will be found 
in this country of wonderful creations many such places for the heal- 
ing of the nations. It seems like a wise provision of nature, that in 
a state so abundantly supplied with all that is valuable in minerals, 
and where men in quest of these ores should encounter exposure most 
trying; that in working in the stock camp they imperil life and limb 
from rheumatic and kindred affections; yet to render him capable of 
carrying on his work that there should be a greater number of health 
cures; and so, these wonderful creations stud the state and are easily 
accessible from all quarters. 

There is as little encouragement to the members of the medical 
profession in Montana as there is in any state of the Union. It is 
no uncommon thing to find families, who live a hundred miles from 
a physician, and when they go for the doctor it is that he is wanted. 
The ozone-laden atmosphere, the clear, nipping, bracing effects of 
living in the clouds, divorces man from aches and pains and except 
for the hypochondriac there is little call for the healer, from those 
who take proper care of both mind and body. 

GAME AND FISH. 

That we are all of savage descent is evidenced by the almost uni- 
versal passion for the sports of the field. This crops out in the scion, 
the farthest descended from original man, no matter how gentle the 
breed, nor how far removed from the wild man, the love of sport 
is universal and widespread. Men are prone to love hunting and fishing 
even as "the sparks fly upward," and finding one not such we are 
apt to regard him with suspicion and fear, as we have cause to fear 
the man of "no small vices," knowing that nature has wrought her 
compensation by making of him a master villain. That opportunities 
for the gratification of these laudable ambitions are abundant in 
Montana is well known to all familiar with the state. Montana 
waters are pure, abundant and well supplied with the natural food 
for fishes. Many of her streams are virgin to the fisherman, where 
the finest of brook trout live and die unmolested by man. Com- 
mencing on the eastern side of the state in the waters of the lower 
Missouri and Yellov.-stone are found the fishes of the Mississippi. 
Rarely do we find these as high as the Great Falls of the Missouri; 
their upward course is obstructed by this miniature Niagara, which 
thunders its mighty volunie of water 90 feet over a sharp precipice 
to the level below. This is a bar to the upward march of the catfish, 
buffalo, pike, pickerel, and the coarser fishes of the lower country. 

A stranger would think that these predatory fish would find 
their way up stream as far as their course was unobstructed by 
natural barriers; but once past the limit of alkali water carried into 
the limpid Yellowstone by streams such as the Powder, Tongue and 
Big Horn rivers, these fish of low degree do not seem to thrive, and 
are rarely if ever caught above the mouths of these streams; hence 
the pure waters are left to game fish. An exception is found, how- 
ever, in the whitefish, which disputes possession of every deep hole 



20 



MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 




BULLETIN NO. 26. 21 



with the gamy trout. To the Easterne'r it is a strange sight to see 
the fisherman whipping big rivers with flies for trout, and it is no 
uncommon thing to catch trout three to four pounds in weight; in- 
deed, this is a common occurrence in all of the main streams of the 
state. In the Gallatin river and Tenderfoot (the latter a trib- 
utary to Deep creek), the graylings of Montana are found. These are 
most beautiful creatures, very gamy, with meat most delicate, lacking 
the oiliness so common to members of the salmon family. 

When first taken from the stream, one would be hard to please 
indeed, were he not charmed with the exquisite form and the bril- 
liancy of coloring of the grayling. They are also models of sym- 
metry, being built on more delicate lines than the heavier-bodied 
trout; the dorsal fin of this fish is a study for the artist, with its 
vivid, highly colored spots fairly rivaling the eyes of the peacock tail. 

The United States government has located a fish hatchery at 
Bozeman. and they are accomplishing that which has never been 
done before in the United States — the successful hatching of grayling 
eggs, and the breeding of these magnificent fish. Here they also make 
a specialty of "steelheads" or salmon trout. These at the age of three 
years attain large size and are a valuable addition to the waters of the 
country. 

The location of this plant renders it possible for every Montana 
brook to be regularly and abundantly stocked with the best of game 
fish. 

CAMPING OUT. 

Summer parties are very popular in Montana, when the entire 
family seek the rest and quietude of some gorgeous mountain canyon. 
Montanans are good campers, and they can give points to the best of 
old sportsmen. 

It is very difficult to state v/hich of the classes of sportsmen — 
the wing shot, the big game hunter or the fisherman — has the best of it. 

In bird shooting there are the ruflled grouse or pheasant, the 
sharp tail grouse, or the prairie chicken (commonly so called), the 
sage hen, and the blue, or mountain grouse. The first are usually 
found along water courses in the willow coverts, and are sufficiently 
abundant to give fine sport. The pinnated grouse, or the true prairie 
chicken, are not found in Montana, but to all intents and purposes 
"the sharp tails" afford equally fine sport. 

It is strange how the habits of birds will change with habitat. 
"The sharp tail" grouse seldom ventures far into the grain fields on 
the states bordering on the Mississippi, but frequents the timbered 
openings; but in Montana they are found in vast numbers in the 
larger valleys, where for miles and miles there is nothing but a suc- 
cession of grain fields and meadows. 

I have seen them so numerous in the Moccasin mountains of the 
.Tudith basin that there were morning and evening flights, as with the 
pigeons, geese or ducks, when countless thousands would seek the 
timbered mountain sides, where they would roost, flying forth to 
the more open country in the morning. On a cold morning they 



22 



MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



would be loath to leave the snug, warm, sheltered hillsides, but would 
occupy the spruce or fir woods by thousands, awaiting the warming 
up of the more open country. 

In some sections they have a peculiar habit, in cold weather, when 
the snow is deep, of burrowing at night in the snow. They fly up 
into the trees, and as night approaches will make a swift downward 
flight, plunging headlong into the soft snowdrift completely out of 
sight. If one wants fun let him ride a half-broken broncho through 
such roosting grounds, at the near approach of the horse they 
v/ill come up out of the snow just under the horse's nose, like a 
bomb bursting. They are so abundant as often to be a great nuisance 
in deer hunting, as they will, from their perches in the heavy timber, 




Copyrig-hted by Ingersoll, Photographer, St. Paul. 
A CAMP IN THE MOUNTAINS. 

see the hunter long before his near approach, and the deer which he 
has tracked so long and patiently is likely to be frightened from the 
thicket, in which it is temporarily resting, by the cackle of the birds 
and the whizz of their wings as they noisily fly away to escape the 
hunter. 

Unfortunately, at this season of the year, the flesh is apt to be 
tainted with the odor of the spruce and fir buds of which they seem 
to be very fond. 

It is the blue grouse, the king of all American game birds, which 
affords prime sport. These birds are one and one-half times the 
size of the "sharp tail" grouse. They spend the most of their lives 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 23 



in the high mountains, but in the spring at mating time come down 
to the foothills and rear their young in the gulches and draws. Their 
diet is largely the young and tender grass, grasshoppers and the many 
wild fruits with which 4the state is so well supplied. They are espe- 
cially fond of service berries, and in the latter days of August and the 
fore part of September they have attained sufficient size to be strong 
of flight. Their flesh is white, like the ruffed grouse, and firm, and 
highly flavored, owing to the delicate nature of their food. 

The Montana law restricts the hunter to twenty birds per day, 
and it does not take long to reach the limit if one strikes a good 
gulch, two or three miles in length, and has a good dog to aid him in 
making his bag. Twenty big. lusty fellows are all one wants to pack 
on his back to camp. 




Hvmting the sage hen is not ignoble sport. When the birds are 
half-grown, they are found contiguous to the sage bi'ush plants, where 
they subsist on grasshoppers and affect the tender buds of the sage 
brush just enough to season the flesh well. They are extremely fond 
of visiting grain fields (particularly wheat) that may be in the near 
vicinity of sage brush thickets. The young, half-grown birds, are 
not tainted with sage, and the older ones can be rid of the objection- 
able Oder by parboiling in two waters prior to cooking. That they are 
the largest of all the grouse family makes them by no means the 
easiest of sport. Their size and the extreme length of v.'ing and 
tail feathers makes me think of nothing so much as the flight of the 
wild turkey; the novice is always swept off his feet by the taking to 
wing of a covey of these big birds. A strange peculiarity of them is 
that they lack the gizzard common to other members of the grouse 
family. 

The water fowl makes quite as much use of the great western 
water routes (the Missouri and its tributaries) to and from the 
northern breeding grounds and the southern winter quarters as they 
do of the so-called Mississippi route. Teals, mallards, canvasbacks, 
geese and brandt make the spring and fall shooting very fine, while 
in many parts of the state teals and mallards breed; in fact, it is 
not uncommon for all these birds, as well as the English snipe and 
killdeers. to winter in Montana. This phase of animal life will give 
an idea of the openness of the Montana winter. 

It is the big game hunting, however, that places meat in the 
smokehouse. Antelope, deer, both black and white tail, elk and bear. 



24 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

There is no such abundance of big game as there was twenty-five to 
fifty years ago, when from the top of the mountains one with a good 
field glass would see the plains and bench lands dotted with bands of 
antelope, deer, elk and buffalo, even as the same plains are to-day popu- 
lated with flocks and herds of sheep, cattle and horses. They have 
been killed off, or driven back into the bad lands, the broken and rolling 
foot hills. Here they will always be found, simply that the country 
is so rough and broken that they can always find secure covert. 
Hunting big game with hounds is absolutely prohibited by law in 
Montana, and still-hunting in open season only is permitted. 




The antelope have been badly decimated by scab, contracted from 
domestic sheep, and as they cling to the plains, they have been out- 
generaled by the hunter, armed with the small bore, smokeless pow- 
der, long range gun. But the elk and black tail deer delight in the 
lofty mountain parks, venturing out of these only as the November 
snow warns them that it is time to "pull their freight" to lower levels. 
They descend very leisurely, oftentimes not reaching the winter feed 
grounds until the law has expired, and they are safe for the nonce. 

The white tail deer is very abundant in the state; and while 
much wilder and warier than its near relative, the black tail, is to 
be found in the willow copses lining the streams, often venturing 
inside the enclosed fields, hiding in the heavy undergrowth along 
the water courses. There is scarcely a trout stream in Montana, 
along whose sandy reaches may not be tracked the cleanly cut foot- 
prints of the white tail. They become quite tame during the close 
season, and it is no uncommon sight for the angler to encounter the 
beautiful, graceful animals as he quietly slips along the stream, 
about sundown or sunrise. 

For many years the state offered a generous bounty for the de- 
struction of bears and lions; latterly this has been abandoned or 
reduced to so low an amount that it is small inducement to hunt 
them. Since then, undoubtedly, they have increased in numbers, and 
the hunter v/ho really desires to find bears can be accommodated if 
in the hands of a reliable guide. 

The fact is that the third of the state is so broken, so rough, 
so precipitous and almost impassible to man that there will always 
be big game in the mountain fastnesses. 

Then, too, the stringent regulations of the government enforced 
in the Yellowstone National Park, a part of the boundary of the 
state, and covering 4,000 square miles, has made of that section, 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 25 



together with the Teton forest reserve joining the park on the east, 
and covering half as much land, a vast game reserve in which deer, 
antelope and elk are annually bred, to be distributed over the neigh- 
boring lower lying lands on the advent of severe winter weather. 

As yet Montana requires no game license laws, and her citizens 
as well as outsiders are welcome to enjoy the magnificent sport to 
be found here, providing they observe the very reasonable and liberal 
state laws for the protection of game. 

One class of hunters will be gladly welcomed, that is experienced 
wolf hunters. 

The great numbers of sheep, cattle and horses on the vast plains 
of the state are a great temptation to the timber v/olf and big gray 
or buffalo wolf. These are slain by the thousands each season, but 
the number does not seem to appreciably decrease, and good wages 
can always be earned by the experienced, temperate hunter, who means 
business. 

"Wolfing is often carried on by men with packs of stag hounds. 
This, as well as jack rabbit coursing with hounds, affords exciting 
sport to those participating. 

Montana has been a popular rendezvous for sportsmen from 
abroad, who have been able to choose their own ground, and have 
hunted here because they were uniformly successful. 

SELECTION OF A HOME. 

Great judgment should be used by the intending settlers as to 
the conditions governing localities. There is always a local coloring 
imparted in time by the residents to settlers which cannot be ignored. 
For example, a resident of Gallatin valley visited an old friend, a 
former Montanan, now residing in South Carolina, where he had 
lived many years after leaving Montana. While in Montana he was 
noted for his love of order and system; his outbuildings, machinery, 
implements, live stock v.'ere always kept in apple pie order. He was 
a man notably regardful of appearances, and his place was a poem 
from the view point of the practical utilitarian. At the Carolina 
railway, the visitor was met by the friend in a ramshackle convey- 
ance, drawn by a span of lazy mules, outfitted with rope traces, lines, 
etc., and the conveyance was the index to the style of general sur- 
roundings. It was an exemplification of an absolute surrender t» 
surrounding conditions. The languorous lassitude of the South had 
accomplished its deadly work; the spiritless, characterless, doless 
negro, his only dependence for labor, had innoculated the place with 
an air the reverse of progressive, and the superior white man had 
succumbed to the paralyzing influences. He was succeeding finan- 
cially, but think of the sacrifice to pride in being compelled to live 
In a fashion amid surroundings despicable to a driving, enterprising 
individual. 

Think again of the equally discouraging conditions to be encoun- 
tered where the Mexican peon sets the gait for agricultural enter- 
prise, handicapped also by an enervating climate. 



26 



MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



In Montana all is different. The altitude, the bracing, driving, 
forcing atmosphere here stimulates to progress, and while much re- 
mains to be done, there is no excuse that it is not done by one long 
enough here to have accomplished. 

The industrious man coming to Montana to become a resident 
is gladly welcomed, and v/hile her citizens are not demonstrative, 
they have a cordial greeting and fair treatment to accord to him, 
who in good faith casts in his lot with them, and desires to be a useful 
member of society. 

Many of the old timers are from the south, and they have brought 
with them the hospitality so delightfully refreshing to one accus- 
tomed to the cold, hard, calculating "down easter." The pursuit of 
life, liberty and happiness can be as successfully undertaken in Mon- 
tana as in any state of the Union, and nowhere can better or more 
law-abiding citizens be found. The rights of property are highly re- 
spected and none need fear to find lacking here the protection to per- 
son and property to which they have been accustomed. Nor does the 
Montanan do right from fear of the law. He exercises better motives; 
he is just and fair to all mankind; he is willing "to live and let live." 

THE AGRICULTURE OF MONTANA. 

The miner, the manufacturer, the lawyer, the physician, these 
are men of professions who when in search of "green fields and pas- 
tures new" seek not for a country of diversified possibilities, but for 
one in which they can exploit their own particular line. 




A MONTANA FARM. 



To such the Montana monograph is not addressed. The farmer 
is the man upon whose brawny shoulders civilization is upborne and 
it is primarily to him that we address this bulletin. 

That farming is a science is undoubted; that ultimate success 
financially and physically will eventuate only in countries and sec- 
tions having a wide range of agricultural possibilities is also true, and 
the writer is of the opinion that more and better potentialities are 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 27 



locked within the fertile soil of Montana, to be awakened by the hand 
of the intelligent laborer, than are to be found in any other portion 
of the great West. 

Diversified farming, well followed, will always be successful here, 
and while the stockman and grain farmer, the owner of the hay 
meadows, have prospered bounteously heretofore, the large, sure re- 
turns will be his who does not risk all the eggs in one basket. Among 
farm crops the following succeed excellently well. 

Wheat, both spring and winter, soft wheat and hard wheat alike, 
are abundant in quantity and prime in quality. Barley does in Mon- 
tana what it never has done and never will do in the great Eastern 
barley fields of the country, namely, develops into strictly No. 1 bar- 
ley. Visit if you please the barley markets of Minnesota, the Dako- 
tas, Iowa and Wisconsin and No. 2 barley is the highest grade quoted 
and No. 3 is the usual best grade in excellence. That this is so in 
Montana is owing to the matchless climate, the long summer days 
in which, in the shade, the thermometer never passes the 92 degree 
mark, to the dewless nights, and cloudless harvest and threshing days. 
Said a Dakota German the past v/eek on being shown a handful out 
of a 1,200 bushel bin of barley, "Veil, but this you haf pleached with 
sulphur or something." Not so. For six years past the sample shown 
was the poorest that could have been found in this particular gran- 
ary. 

Gallatin County had a yield of 6,640 bushels of prime No. 1 bar- 
ley in 1899 harvested from an eighty-acre field. 

OATS. 

One must see a Montana oat field, breast high to a six-footer, 
even, level, the heavy cow boy hat can be thrown at random onto the 
standing grain, and it will lie there buoyed up by the stiff rank straw. 
Cut a stalk at the ground and examine it critically, it is of the diam- 
eter of a pipe stem, 48 to 60 inches tall, its upper 16 to 18 inches 
occupied by the branching panicles, their sheaths all fully occupied 
by big, plupxp kernels. Small wonder that the measured bushel off- 
sets the 42 to 48 pound notch of the steel yard, and that yields in excess 
of 100 bushels to the acre, and as high as 129 bushels per acre, have 
been harvested and threshed in Montana. 

Think of it, a record of an excess of three tons of grain from an 
acre of land, a greater tonnage of choice grain in Montana than of 
the best clover hay of the Eastern states. Here is the natural loca- 
tion of the oatmeal mill, where raw material incomparable in quality 
<^an be found. 

While the hoofage of Montana sheep, cattle and horses exceeds 
that of other states, it should be borne in mind that it is the third 
largest state in the Union, and that for 75 per cent of the year these 
animals roam the open pastures of the state, when it is not possible 
to harvest their droppings to be added to the tilled fields to supple- 
ment depleted fertility, for we do not pretend to tell you that these 
lands are productive beyond the dreams of man, or will never require 
to be nourished to maintain their present fertility, and while under 



MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



present conditions it may not be feasible to spread barnyard manure 
on every needy acre, yet we have otlier and better means of restoring 
depleated fertility in the legume and root crops for which the state is 
so justly famous. 

Pass through the great Mississippi valley, you may cover mile 
after mile and never pass a clover field. Why is this? Surely the 
scientist tells us that the legume (member of the clover family) is 
the only available nitrogen trap in which the great etherized chemical 
soil necessity may be imprisoned and held captive for the benefit of the 
plant, so dependent thereon for its perfect development. Do not these 
fields need the revivifying effect attendant upon the application of 
nitrogen to the growing plant? Most assuredly. For almost half a 
century these fields have been cropped to the depleting fertility crops 
of grain and timothy hay; and had it not been for the dairy cow, that 
has been a soil savior to all this vast region, the land would long 
since have ceased to be a reliable means of support to the farmer, let 
alone the provision for the wants of millions, who look to these areas 
for daily food. But does not the cow and clover field move on in 
harmony and unison? They do; but unfortunately tv/o things are 
essential in the best clover culture; the natural nitrification of the 
soil, i. e. (the presence of clover bacteria without which the clover 
plant will not start up into vigorous existence) and a certain reliable 
source of moisture to stimulate the plant to its best development; lack- 
ing these, the result is a sickly, spindling, tedious form of growth, oft- 
entimes requiring 16 months or 500 days to become thoroughly estab- 
lished; while in the irrigated parts of Montana it has frequently hap- 
pened that 3,000 pounds of cured clover hay has been harvested from 
an acre inside of 115 days from seeding. Clover bacteria are present 
throughout the state in abundance and the results often equal 14,000 
pounds of cured hay per acre per annum. 

Green clover is never turned under in Montana. Were this to be 
done the land would be so stimulated that future grain crops would 
not stand up from sheer weight of straw. 

The field pea, the superior of Indian corn at every comparable 
point, is nowhere at home as it is in Montana. Forty to fifty bushels 
of peas, 8,000 pounds of cured forage from the straw, vines 12 feet 
in length. This is one of the most powerful stimulants to vegetation 
as a rotation factor. Roots are here produced in such vast profusion 
as to make the jealous Scotchman green with envy. 

POTATOES. 

In the American agriculturist competition of the seventies a Yel- 
lowstone farmer harvested 1,213 bushels of pota^toes from a measured 
acre of land, and 50,000 pounds of sugar beets have been produced on 
a Bitter Root acre. Mangels, carrots, turnips, all yield beyond ex- 
pectation on mellow, irrigable lands. 

Cabbage that span five feet in diameter, and when dressed for 
market weigh 40 pounds, are not uncommon. Squash and pumpkins 
weighing 100 pounds and upwards are often harvested. 



30 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

Celery that does not run to seed or rust is a usual crop on the 
farm. 

With the exception of the tomato, water and musk melon, egg^ 
plant, okra and sweet potato, the vegetables of the East all succeed 
well and thrive in an unexampled manner. That these exceptions do 
not thrive is the penalty paid for being so high up in the clouds, 
where the thinness and rarity of the atmosphere insure cool nights 
with the going down of the sun. Nights too cool to insure the 
ripening process, the continuity of which must not be broken by 
rapid changes in temperature. Nature is kind to Montanans, however. 
In exchange for this trifling disability, they are insured that immunity 
from tuberculous and catarrhal disease so fatal in sections where these 
vegetables and fruits thrive so perfectly. 

It is in the perfect measure of success attendant upon fruit culture 
that Montana prides herself. The writer confesses to a fairly in- 
timate acquaintance with the state, and is of the opinion that there 
is not an eighty-acre tract in the state upon which small grains can 
be successfully grown, but that the annual family fruit supply may 
not be provided. Some sections of the state, notably the part west of 
the main range, produce abnormally fine apples, crabs, pears, plums, 
apricots, peaches, nectarines, grapes and all the small fruits, beautiful 
in form, rich in color, choice in flavor. 

Select the best acre of clover in the Mississippi valley, give it 
every opportunity to develop, harvest, cure and weigh, and unless its 
yield exceeds 10,000 (5 tons) to the acre, the tonnage of hay can be 
equaled by the normal strawberry crop of Montana, 10,000 quarts 
per acre being a fair yield, where good varieties under good culture 
and irrigation are practiced. 

The culture of Indian corn as well as broom corn has been re- 
munerative in the low valleys on the east side of the state, where 
the nights are warmer. Alfalfa seed has also yielded nine bushels tf> 
the acre. 

Montana could well be classified as a vast seed garden for the 
many sorts of vegetables, grains and grasses that do well in this sec- 
tion. Seed, grains would invariably be improved in character by in- 
troduction to our soil and climate. The tobacco plant does well, also 
buckwheat, rye, rape, millet, flax and beans. 

It m^y be safely said that for any crop of the temperate zone, 
a congenial location can be found in some part of the great State of 
Montana. 

After, ten years' residence in Montana I am convinced that 40 
acres of prime soil under irrigation and cultivation will equal in yield 
and net returns fully as much as would 160 acres in any other part 
of the humid states. 

RAILWAYS OF MONTANA. 

The question of transportation is one of vital import to the v,-ould- 
be settler, as it means to him opportunity for marketing produce and 
disposing of his ? irplus. Tr^'t Montana is the third largest state in 
the Union wouh' >-33 )ly tha" :i^uch of Its area is remote from rail- 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 31 



ways. But there are about 3,000 miles of railway within its borders — 
or enough to span its width five times from east to west. 

There is but one county that is not traversed by rail, and that 
is Fergus, almost the center county of the state, and it is confidently 
expected that it will soon be reached by the Montana Railroad Co., 
which is rapidly building in that direction. 

That the state is traversed in part by four of the leading Western 
trunk lines, the Northern Pacific, the Great Northern, the Burlington, 
and the Oregon Short Line, is a guarantee as to the character of the 
service afforded the state by its railways. Montana traflSc and travel 
is appreciated by these lines, as is shown by the great activity mani- 
fested by them in throwing branch lines into every district contiguous 
to their main lines, productive of business. The relative percentage of 
travel in Montana is larger to its population than in any other state 
in the Union. An extremely liberal policy is manifested toward the 
railways with respect to the enactment of legislation inimical ti) 
them. 

The feeling prevails in large part that it is to the railways that 
development is due, too many old-timers are still on deck who too well 
remember days when they were compelled to pay from seven to ten 
cents per pound for carriage of freights to endorse a policy that would 
be prohibitive to railway extension. On the other hand, the roads and 
their management are disposed to be fair and liberal with Montana 
patrons. Important, self-imposed reductions in passenger and freight 
tariffs are being made voluntarily; and an immense tonnage is being 
developed in mining operations. It is not only the carriage of the re- 
fined ore as it leaves the smelters, but this ore is hauled to the 
smelters in a crude, bulky form, and not only is the native ore as it 
comes from the mines a severe tax on transportation facilities, but 
there must be carried to the smelters coal and limestone, the latter 
used in fluxing the ores. 

The item of the carriage of mine machinery alone is a great 
source of revenue to the railways. Again, the mines call for timber; 
literally by the millions of feet, for timbering up tunnels and shafts. 
So that it can readily be seen that a state of such great mineral de- 
velopment calls for all the resources available of both labor and trans- 
portation ; all of which inures to the general benefit of the farm popula- 
tion of the state. 

Great pride is taken by the railway management in keeping their 
lines in the best of order, in stocking them with the best patterns of lo- 
comotives, and their passenger trains are marvels of neatness and 
strength. Accidents in the mountains are extremely rare, a really 
bad passenger train wreck has never happened in the history of the 
railways in the state. 



EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITY IN MONTANA, 



Naturally the man of family, the one who would be a desirable 
addition to a community, is interested in knowing what the state 
offers to youth along the lines of schooling. 



32 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

Foi' years the great West was cut off from Eastei^n opportunities 
by lack of railway communication, and only men and the hardiest of 
women were able to bridge the intervening gaps and to reach the 
mountains by a long, tedious and dangerous wagon journey. In those 
days education was not possible, but with the extension of the trans- 
continental lines all this has changed. The very deprivations of 
schools, churches and other civilizing institutions begat in the minds 
of the pioneers a keen desire for the very best of its kind in all these 
directions. And these pioneers were striking characters; puny men 
and women did not brave the toils and privations of the overland 
route, and a class found their way to the mountains able to make 
history. They gave their sturdy, energetic impress to their adopted 
state, and in no other respect is this to be so plainly seen as in educa- 
tional lines. With other Western states, the common schools have an 
eighteenth part of the public domain as an annuity from whence to 
draw for their support, and this is no mean thing where it amounts 
to more than five million acres. None of these lands can be sold 
for less than $10 per acre, so the value of the state endowment from 
the general government for free tuition is more than fifty million 
dollars. In addition to this, the v/ants of higher education have been 
well cared for in the establishment of the State University, Reform 
School, School of Mines, the State Normal School, Deaf and 
Dumb Asylum and the Agricultural College. These have a 
donation of 580,000 acres, worth more than five million dol- 
lars. As a matter of fact, but little land has been sold 
at the present time for the benefit of any of these institutions, but the 
state has an active, energetic board of state land commissioners, which 
is leasing the lands of these institutions, so as to bring to the state 
treasury, for their benefit a quarter of a million dollars annually. And 
not only from this source but from direct taxation, for the benefit of 
public schools, large sums of money are annually raised to promote 
education. 

Every man, woman and child (of the age of intelligence) is 
proud of the state's means for the diffusion of knowledge. The per- 
centage of illiteracy is lower in Montana than in any of the states in the 
Union. Better wages are paid instructors than elsewhere. A peculiar 
.-system prevails in the state; every year a special tax is levied for the 
anaintenance (in large part) of the schools. The legislature of 1898 
provided for this annual tax, by a law amending the original law, and 
rthrough some inadvertency that portion of the bill which provided for 
■,the special levy was found to be defective and unconstitutional and 
therefore the usual tax could not be levied nor collected. This ordinar- 
ily, in the majority of Eastern states beyond doubt would have closed 
the schools, but not so in Montana. Private citizens, all over the state, 
put their names to subscription papers for the support of the public 
■schools, and almost without exception the public schools have been 
kept open and running the usual full term of the school year. 

The motto of the Montanan in the matter of teachers and instruct- 
ors is "the best are none too good." This policy has stocked the schools 
with a class of teachers of superior intellect and ability. 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 33 



Aside from the higher public institutions named, there are colleges 
of higher learning at Deer Lodge and Helena; also there are numer- 
ous business colleges in the state. 

Few of the states of the Union enjoy the same class of educational 
facilities as does Montana, and no one need fear the sacrifice of educa- 
tional opportunity in seeking a Montana home. 

SUGAR BEET CULTURE. 

Some years ago the department of agriculture, through its chemical 
division, issued what was termed a sugar beet chart, showing the 
sugar beet belt in the United States. Beginning about Long Island it 
finds its way eventually to Los Angeles, Cal., apparently as if blind- 
folded, pursuing its route by the most devious ways across the con- 
tinent. I take it that this was made from the data of tests in the 
possession of Dr. Wiley made by the department and based on produc- 
tion of beets containing 12 per cent saccharine matter. This was 
issued in 1898, and leaves Montana very much "out in the cold," spite 
of the fact that one could not ask for better conditions for growth of 
beets than are to be found in Montana. 

Sugar consumption is a no inconsequential item considered merely 
from the point of the cost of transportation of the article from the 
Western seaboard to Montana. The sugar consumption of the state 
is about 10,000,000 pounds per year. This means 250 cars of 40,000 
pounds to the car or about $100,000 paid for freight. Even if the sugar 
cost as much to produce in Montana as it costs on the coast (much 
of the sugar consumed in Montana comes from the Hawaiian islands), 
and the single item of freight could be saved, it would be well worth 
while. Can sugar be produced advantageously in Montana? For 
four years the Montana experiment station has been testing beets for 
sugar content, yields, etc. Beets should contain 12 per cent of 
saccharine matter to be commercially valuable, and such command 
from $4.50 to $5 per ton, depending upon locality. Beets averaging a 
less content are relatively less valuable, while those containing more 
than 12 per cent are correspondingly more valuable. We have data 
for the following averages on experiment station grounds: 



1895 — Sugar in beets, 14.1 per cent. 
1896 — Sugar in beets, 15.1 per cent. 
1897 — Sugar in beets, 17 per cent. 
1898 — Sugar in beets, 13.6 per cent. 



Average for four years, 14.9 per cent. 

In 1896 an experiment was made to determine when the beets 
would carry sufficient sugar to be profitable to dig. Beginning Septem- 
ber 18th the sugar content was 15 per cent. November 1st the sugar 
content was 15.8 per cent. This gave a season in which beets could 
be harvested over a period of forty-two days. Co-operative tests of 
1896 of many farmers in different parts of the state showed an average 
of 13.9 per cent sugar content. 

In these tests was one of a common red beet, which contained 
only 4.8 sugar content. 



34 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

Fifty-eight co-operative tests of beets in various parts of the 
state in 1897 showed an average of sugar content of 14.03 per cent. 
Twenty co-operative tests of beets in various parts of the state in 1898 
showed an average of sugar content of 14.5 per cent. 

Individual analyses during these years have shown as high a sugar 
content as 20.2, 21, 17.8, 18.4, 19.2, 20. 

Montana is certainly entitled to a place on the sugar beet chart, 
if sugar content indicates anything. 

Sugar beets grown under irrigation are much more cheaply pro- 
duced than in the humid states, simply that the stage of development 
from the sowing of the seed to the time when the ground is shaded 
with beet foliage and weed growth checked is much shorter under 
irrigation. This is true of all crops to which water can be artificially 
applied advantageously. It almost doubles the crop and halves the 
period of time required to the deposition of sugar to the point where 
beets can be profitably harvested for manufacture. 

Our opinion is that beets could be worked into sugar by the first 
week in August, leaving a season of more than a hundred days for the 
campaign of harvesting into sugar. 

Winter seldom shows its teeth in good earnest until after Novem- 
ber 15, and ample time could be assured to manufacture the beets. 
Beet culture will supersede the practice of summer fallow, and with 
fifteen tons of beets per acre worth $75 gross, there will be a hand- 
some margin between the crop production and the sum realized. The 
beet pulp will supply valuable materials for fattening live stock. 

Few states offer the same tempting opportunity to make beet sugar 
as does Montana. 

DAIRYING IN MONTANA. 

Three states in the Mississippi valley have a right to give credit 
to this industry for their financial redemption. These are Wisconsin, 
Minnesota and Iowa. 

Exclusive, long-continued grain culture had left the lands minus 
fertility and their owners minus hope. The v/iriter once heard Gov- 
ernor Gear of Iowa state that he had known Iowa when one could 
start from the Mississippi river in the southeast corner of the state, 
drive to the western boundary, and never be off a mortgaged farm. 
This was under a grain culture system; but that thanks to "the cow 
with the crumpled horn," this condition had passed away, and general 
dairying had reversed conditions, making of the state a fountain of 
perennial wealth to the tillers of the soil. 

The same is true of Minnesota. In the years of '79, '80 and '81, 
a few of us having faith in the dairy cow, interested ourselves in 
the promotion of dairying in that state. Two decades later, as the 
fruit of our labors, more than eight hundred creameries and cheese 
factories: are clearing houses for the million dairy cows of the state, 
and more than $30,000,000 are added annually to Minnesota's bank 
account from this one source. Rash v/ould he be who would under- 
take to total the gross financial benefit to the state resulting from 
the cow. 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 35 



There are many counts to be made, a total revision of crops, 
bringing soil fertility, the by-products of pork and poultry, neither 
of which can be most profitably grown without milk being used as a 
prominent factor for their food; but, best of all, is the placing of the 
farm upon a permanent cash basis and the elimination of the greatest 
cur^e of the farmer, "the running store account," which, like a cancer, 
will eventually eat out the heart of the victim. 

Wisconsin has even greater results from the cow than have Iowa 
or Minnesota. These facts and experiences present food for thought 
to Montanans. Can we derive the same benefit from this line as the 
above named states? Physical conditions enter largely into the suc- 
cess of any agricultural undertaking. Can the cow be profitably sus- 
tained in Montana? 

A partial reply to this is the experience of the wild cattle, the 
buffalo, the elk, the deer, the antelope and mountain sheep. All these 
in countless numbers of the finest development covered Montana 
ranges until driven off or slaughtered by skin hunters. 

Their place is filled to-day by millions upon millions of sheep, 
cattle and horses. 

There is an excess of food upon the ranges of the state, under a 
system of. fencing and pasturage, to carry double the present number, 
without an acre of tame forage being added. So much for the native 
grasses and forage plants. 

Are these choice dairy product producers? 

Better than anything in the line of the improved forage plants 
grown in the three great named dairy states. 

Can anything better be grown under cultivation in Montana? 

Unquestionably the legumes (red, white, medium, mammoth clo- 
vers, alfalfa, alsike, sain-foin, field peas) are an improvement over 
native food plants. 

Will they thrive in Montana? 

Montana is the natural home of the clover plant. Nearly all the 
mountain canyons carry native clovers. No soil nitrification is neces- 
sary to insure clover thrift. In any of the great valleys of the state, 
notably the Yellowstone, the Gallatin, the Bitter Root and the Flat- 
head, the early summer air is redolent with the sv/eet perfume from 
the countless clover acres. 

Are silos common in Montana? 

They are not, nor are hay barns, barracks or sheds. 

From July 1st until New Year, when the bulk of the hay is 
consumed, there is but little falling weather; clover hay goes into 
the stock, robbed of but little of its rich coloring of green, and a 
button-hole bouquet can be culled from any well cured clover stock 
at almost any season of the year, the deep rich crimson of the bloom 
having lost but little of its matchless beauty by being harvested and 
housed. 

From two to five crops, under irrigation, are harvested, and 14,000 
pounds per acre is not an uncommon annual crop from red clover or 
alfalfa. 



3fi 



MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 




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fa 

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BULLETIN NO. 2G. 37 



So much for roughage. In addition, sweet corn for fodder is 
unequaled when irrigated. It produces so rank and heavy a growth 
that a single row is all that a big team can cut with a mower or a 
binder. Again, the grain crops are so heavy and the yield so ab- 
normal that the every food want of a cow can be satisfied in Montana 
as in no other region outside of the Rocky mountains. 

The comparative mildness of the winters, the purity of the atmos- 
phere, the abundance of 42-degree spring waters, clear and pure 
beyond the conception of the native of the Mississippi valley, all of 
these make ideal conditions for dairying. 

What of dairy stock? Can it be procured in Montana? 

One finds better blood on the open ranges of Montana than inside 
of the eastern fences. A single instance will afford light. Six two- 
year Shorthorn heifers, cut out of a range bunch, turned inside fences, 
on good blue joint and timothy pastures, without a pound of grain or 
bran, gave in their two-year form sixteen hundred pounds of butter in 
a twelvemonth. 

Such foundation stock needs only to be mated with pedigreed 
dairy bulls to make world beaters. 

What of the markets? 

From fifteen to twenty million pounds of iniported (purported) 
butter is consumed annually in Montana. The regular, undeviating 
price is 25 cents per pound. 

This is a good business from the local demand, to begin with, 
and situated on the great highway to the Orient, there can be no 
question but that dairying in Montana can be made a first-class busi- 
ness proposition by those who are familiar with the business. 

No state in the Union to-day offers such a field to the dairyman 
as does Montana. 

BEAVERHEAD COUNTY. 

Beaverhead county is a prominent southwestern county of Mon- 
tana, it borders on the Rocky mountains, and its altitude is well 
toward 5,000 feet. 

Its name is an Indian appellation. Some state that its streams 
were so well stocked with beaver as to give the name to the region^ 
others to the general shape of the county, its outlines being said to 
resemble a beaver's head. This is unlikely, as the county's name is 
of more recent origin than the stream. Certain it is that the In- 
dians considered the words Beaverhead and Wisdom to be interchange- 
able (the Wisdom or Big Hole and the Beaverhead rivers being the 
leading streams of the county), as they looked upon the beaver as 
being the v.asest and brainiest of all the beasts. 

This county takes high rank as a range section. 

The fame of the flocks and herds of the Big Hole country (i. e., 
the valley of the Big Hole or Wisdom river) is state wide. 

This, spite of the fact of its extreme altitude; many erroneously 
suppose that high altitudes stand for feeble vegetation. This is true 
in a measure, as to the grov.'th of timber, as all mountaineers recognize 
"timber line" (about 9,000 feet) as being that altitude on the moun- 



38 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

tains at which timber ceases to thrive. It is an open question, if this 
be owing to the lowness of the temperature or that moisture is not 
available for the development of the tree; certain it is, however, that 
herbage good in quality is to be found at such height as soil is present 
in which to find root. The old saying, "The higher up the mountain 
side, the greener grows the grass," is a true one, and we can usually 
expect to find the choicest summer feed in the lofty mountain parks, 
where from six to eight months of the year all the face of nature is 
buried under many feet of snow. This snow gradually melting unde'- 
the revivifying effects of the summer sun fills the soil with a welcome 
supply of moisture. Strange it is that it is not an infrequent oc- 
currence for the snows to fall and lie the winter through on unfrozen 
soil. 

This is easy of explanation if v/e remember that after the fall 
equinox that which is rain in the valleys is invariably snow on the 
higher levels, and that these periodical storms come without much 
warning or a lowering of the temperature. 

Were it not for this the springs and stream sources would not 
receive a reliable supply, as in much of the country in which the 
deepest snows fall, the ground is very broken and precipitous and if 
the soil was frozen prior to snow fall the surface run off would be so 
rapid that but little moisture would find its way to the inner reservoir 
sites. 

So that we may expect that high lying valleys are fine grass val- 
leys, and that the wealth of live stock v/ill always be in direct propor- 
tion to the supply of subsistence thereof. 

Beaverhead is a fine alfalfa region, and the area devoted to this 
magnificent legume is constantly increasing. 

The supply of water for irrigation purposes is good and its ag- 
ricultural future is bright. 

Dillon, the county seat, is charmingly situated on the Beaverhead 
river. Here is located the State Normal School and it is taking de- 
served rank as an educational center. 

Extensive mining operations, both placer and quartz, are conducted 
in the county. The value of its mineral output in 1899 was about 
$600,000. 

The relative consumption of food material, both by man and beast, 
in mining camps is much higher than in pastoral or civic com- 
munities, and, as reliable mining plants are always on a cash basis, 
the value of such market to the farmer and stockman cannot be 
overestimated. 

This county had for many years a great advantage in that it was 
on the line of the overland route to the Eastern railway, and stage 
travel in all the early days of the territory coming via the Union 
Pacific to Corinne, Utah, thence overland to Virginia City, the first 
capital of Montana. Later the Union Pacific built a line of railway 
from Ogden, Utah, north through Beaverhead, Silver Bow and Deer 
Lodge counties to Garrison, Mont. 

This early infiux of travel had no doubt, much to do with the 
county's prominence in state affairs and its general development. 
Certain it is that it will always be a good section for mixed hus- 
bandry, for cattle, sheep, horses, swine and dairy interests. 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 39 



Railway and market communications with Butte, that great hive 
of human indu'.->try, will always insure a good market for farm pro- 
ducts. 

BROADWATER COUNTY. 

This is the smallest county in the state, containing less than 
1,000 square miles, but it is one of the oldest in point of settlement. 
The placer mines in Confederate gulch yielded enormously in the 
early days; and after the ground was worked over many remained 
and engaged in farming and stock growing. Its eastern boundary is 
the Big Belt mountains, and the western part is a series of foot hills 
thrown out from the Boulder mountains. The Missouri river bisects 
the county equally; and while one would think it good business policy 
to use streams of this magnitude as county boundaries, it is not so 
important in this section of rapid falls to streams and attendant im- 
munity from the floods that are so destruccive in lower altitudes. A 
bridge once properly located and constructed, stands for years; such 
structures are not so numerous as in more densely settled sections, 
and the acquisition of the rich bottom lands pertaining usually to 
both stream margins is to be desired. 

Broadwater has a relatively mild climate, and has three principal 
sources of revenue; these in their respective order are mining, live 
stock and farming. Farming and stock raising do not go hand in hand 
in Montana, as many of the heaviest cattlemen do comparatively little 
farming. This is changing, however, year by year, and many of the 
farmers find it valuable to own sufficient cattle to glean the stub- 
bles in the winter months. With the advent of spring, everything 
is branded and the band goes out into the uplands and foot hills for 
the summer and fall months. 

The statement has been made that cattle thus handled learn the 
seasons, and that when the whistle of the steam thresher is heard 
in the land, the wise, old dames who head the herd, begin to move 
toward the farms and winter pastures. 

On the north bank of the Missouri there are desirable farming 
lands, easy of irrigation, the river traversing the entire length of the 
county. On the south side there are also extensive stretches of land 
between the mountains and the river, but much of it lies too high to 
admit of successful irrigation without very heavy expenses. In the 
extreme southern part of the county, known as the Crow creek and 
the Hot Springs valley, there is a large scope of country that can be 
irrigated by a high line canal from the Jefferson river. These lands 
will be extremely valuable for farm crops as soon as irrigated. At 
present they are mainly useful as stock ranges. Adjoining the Big 
Belt foot hills wherever water is accessible, are fine orchard sites 
on all northern and western slopes. Fruit is doing finely. The hardy 
apples, crabs, plums and cherries are unequalled, and small fruits, 
especially the strawberry, succeed better nowhere. Many young and 
promising commercial orchards are planted, and the first harvests are 
being received therefrom. The apple is the Wealthy. A peculiarity 
of Montana altitude and climate is that this apple, which, at its best 



40 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



in its original habitat, Minnesota, is a fall apple or very early winter, 
is in Montana a fairly good keeper, frequently being found in prime 
condition in March. This is owing to two conditions. The rare, drj'' 
climate gives to the texture of the fruit a more durable substance, 
while from irrigation the fruit reaches maturity with all of the fruit 
interstices well occupied with moisture. Under care, this evaporates 
slowly, and there is not that shrinking and shriveling so common to 
this most delicious of apples in a climate tending to extreme drying 
at the time when the fruit is maturing. 

Broadwater county is attaining distinction as an alfalfa county, 
and will prove to be naturally adapted to sugar-beet culture. 

Lands are very low in comparison to their value. Nearly a third 
of its area has been claimed and this is a safe criterion as to its 
relative value. 

Its mines turned out a half a million in 1899, and there is a vast 
outcome to them. 

Broadwater is an attractive county to the immigrant. Traversed by 
the Northern Pacific railway, the pioneer line, and having access to 
the markets of Helena and Butte, there is great opportunity for the 
industrious tiller of the soil. 

CARBON COUNTY. 

Carbon county is one of the lately formed counties, having been 
created in 1896. It contains 2,520 square miles and derives its name 
from the inexhaustible beds of bituminous coal which underlie large 
areas of its surface. The Bear Tooth mountains, a spur from the main 
range, lie on its southern boundary, and the Pryor mountains, which 
are a continuation of the Big Horn range in Wyoming, form a large 
part of the eastern boundary. Prominent streams of the county are 
the Stillwater river, which forms a large part of the eastern boundary, 
the Little and Big Rosebud, Red Lodge and Rocky Fork creeks, and 
the Clarke's Fork of the Yellowstone, while the Yellowstone river forms 
its northern boundary. Five years ago Carbon county was a portion of 
the great Crow reserve of South Montana, and the most persistent effort 
was necessary to secure its opening up to settlement. The Indians 
were extremely loathe to cede this, as it was their favorite hunting 
ground. The effort to secure its cession was so long continued as to 
advertise it very thoroughly, and soon after it was legally opened all 
lands were filed upon under the homestead law act. Settlers, however, 
were required by special act to pay $1.50 per acre in addition to a fixed 
period of residence, the cash payment being used to pay the govern- 
ment for the moneys used in acquiring Indian title. As it happened 
those who secured homesteads were men from adjoining counties, 
large numbers being from Gallatin county, this being considered the 
foremost of all Montana counties in irrigation methods. The influx 
of setters familiar with existing conditions has had a marked effect 
upon the opening up and improving of the farm lands. 

This county has a larger irrigated area in proportion to its gross 
size than any county in the state except Gallatin. 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 41 



The general lay of the land is most favorable for turning the water 
out of the smaller streams onto the land. Ditches are cheaply con- 
structed, and there is not a single large ditch proposition in the 
county. 

Coal mines are being opened at Red Lodge, Gebo and Bridger, 
the former having been in operation for some ten years or more, with 
a shipment of 2,000 tons of coal per day. The mines in full operation 
employ 2,000 miners, which will represent a populatien of about 10,000 
to be supplied with agricultural products. This home market has been 
the factor in the development of agi'icultural products here. 

Clarke's Fork is one of the principal tributaries of the Yellowstone, 
and carries a large amount of water available for irrigation, 
Clarke's Fork bottoms are extended and embrace a large area of 
agricultural land, and ov/ing to a large admixture of silic?., in the 
soil is the warmest and quickest soil in Montana. 

Small grains succeed excellently, as do Indian corn, fruit, pump- 
kins, tomatoes, watermelons and other farm and garden crops, the 
successful cultivation of which is debarred in many parts of Montana 
by reason of the high altitudes with attendant cold nights through the 
ripening period of crops. Fruits are also being most successfuly 
cultivated. Wild plums of superior quality are indigenous to Carbon 
county, as are currants, gooseberries, raspberries and strawberries. 

Along the higher bench lands extending out from the slopes of 
the foot hills and the mountains are extensive areas of land, too high 
to admit of irrigation. From their contiguity to the lofty mountains 
they secure a greater moisture deposit than do the valley lands. These 
have induced a very rank growth of grass and such slopes have always 
been considered as among the best for stock grazing for all seasons 
of the year except in the dead of winter. These lands are destined 
to become great producers of winter cereals, wheat and rye, so much 
so that the lower irrigable lands need never be taxed for wheat and 
rye production, but can be reserved for barley, stock, grain and forage 
production. 

This county is traversed by two branches of the Northern Pacific 
railway, the Rocky Fork and the Bridger branches, while the main line 
skirts its northern boundary. 

This county of all in Montana offers the greatest promise of being 
devoted to the small farmer, the one operating eighty acres, and as 
such has a great future ahead of it. 

CASCADE COUNTY. 

Cascade county was organized in 1887, from portions of Choteau, 
Meagher and Lewis and Clark counties. Its area is 2,600 square 
miles. Recent legislation has added to the area the territory embraced 
in the mining camp of Neihart, this being connected with Great 
Falls — the county seat of Cascade — by railway. The existence of 
this county and the phenomenal development of the city of Great 
Falls and the surrounding country is due to the water power in the 
Missouri river, which flows through the county, Great Falls being 
near the center and situated on both banks of the river. Within the 



42 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

space of ten miles there is a fall in the bed of the river of 514 feet. 
The river from the foot of "White Bear island to the Great Falls of 
the Missouri river, a, distance of about ten miles, is a series of falls 
and rapids, the whole culminating in the Great Falls, with a height of 
ninety feet. 

There is within the city limits of Great Falls a water power 
equivalent to 350,000 horse power, and there are located here the 
extensive smelting and electrolytic plant of the Boston & Montana 
Copper Co. and that of the Silver Smelting Co., as well as numerous 
other manufacturing concerns, the monthly pay roll averaging about 

a million dollars. 

FALLS OF THE MISSOURI. 

One of the largest flour mills in the West is here located, the Royal 
Milling Co. It is said of Great Falls that it is "down hill from every 
mine in the state," a fact that renders it possible to move ore for 
treatment from the mines by rail at a very low cost for motive power. 
There has grown up in a little over ten years a modern city of about 
15,000 inhabitants, with a wonderful future ahead of it. Up to date- 
the interests of Cascade county have been associated largely with 
mining and range stock enterprises, but the day is not far distant 
when its principal source of revenue will be from the development of 
the marvelous agricultural possibilities of the county in and around 
the city. Were one to describe a circle with Great Falls as the center 
its radius having a length of twenty miles, there v/ould be included 
within this circle, whose diameter was forty miles in length, scarcely 
a square rod of land, that is not tillable, lands of wonderful fertility 
and capable of enormous productiveness. The outer circumference of 
the circle would rest not,, far, on the east, from the Highwood 
mountains, on the south the Little and Big Belts, and upon the skirts 
of these mountains, as well as in much of the foot-hill environment of 
both these ranges, are many thousand acres of land, suitable for 
winter grain, which will never require irrigation for crop production. 
If fact, one of the greatest bars to irrigation enterprises in this county 
has been the successful cropping of dry land farms, independent of any 
water supply. 

Cascade county, notwithstanding the fact that phenomenal grain 
crops have been made without irrigation (wheat crops for ten years 
past having averaged twenty-nine bushels per acre), is destined to be 
the seat of intense activity in canal operations. 

In the immense scope of country in the described circle in and 
about Great Falls, there is but little land lying too high to be covered 
by water taken from the Missouri river, near its exit from the Big 
Belt mountains, near the gate of the mountains, at Hardy, Mont. 

This is the beginning of the Great Plains region of the Upper 
Missouri country, and is now wonderfully productive of range grass 
and forage plants. These lands lie along the south side of the river, 
the river at this point swinging from north to a northeasterly course, 
the natural fall of the country being southeasterly. 

On the north side of the river approaching the city from the 
main range of the Rockies, from the westward is the Sun river, which, 
with its tributaries, carries nearly enough water to irrigate the lands 
lying to the north and west of Great Falls. The water in these 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 



43 




44 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

streams, together with that of the smaller ones, now used to some 
extent in irrigation, Deep creek. Belt creek, Little Belt, Otter, Willow 
and others carry a sufficient water supply to place under irrigation 
large quantities of lands, perhaps a sufficient amount, which, if lands 
on which irrigation is not required are considered, v/ould be ample 
to place under successful cultivation the entire area of farm land 
in the county, thus adding enormously to the productive capacity of 
the county. 

Careful estimates have been made by reputable engineers of the 
cost of placing the bench lands lying to the south and east of the city 
under irrigation, and it has been found that the expense v/ould be 
about $7.50 per acre. Certainly a small amount when the increased 
value of such irrigated land is considered. 

Much of the 2,500 bushels of wheat consumed daily by the Royal 
Milling Co. is produced in the section named. Yields are excellent, and 
the quality is of the best. These lands, too, are remarkably well qual- 
ified for the production of export barley, the soil being heavier than 
that of the Gallatin, with a longer growing season. 

In the valleys of the Belt and Deep creek as well as along the 
Missouri river bottoms, in sections favorable to the cheap transfer of 
water on to the land, a profitable market garden business has been 
conducted for the local trade of Great Falls, and the coal mine camps 
of Belt and Sand Coulee. Fruits, too, have been tested with the best 
of results, in apples, crabs, cherries, plums, and the small fruits gen- 
erally. In no part of Montana is there a greater opportunity for ex- 
pansion in agriculture; and in no other county is the farmer thrown 
so completely upon his individual resources. Primarily the lands now 
occupied by this county were devoted solely to pastoral purposes. 
Much of its area is now thus used and naturally those who have a 
financial interest in the free use of these valuable government lands 
do not offer warm encouragement to the farmers to take up these lands 
to fence and to farm them, simply that by so doing he curtails the 
open range to that extent. Again, since the establishment of Great 
Falls, its main support has come directly or indirectly from the mines, 
and the interest and attention of the citizens has been along mineral 
and stock rather than agricultural lines. 

The population most valuable to any new country is that which 
is acquainted with existing conditions, and, while many have settled in 
Great Falls from the irrigable areas of Montana, they have gone there 
to embark in business apart from farming, and many of the settlers 
have followed the line of the railway from sections where farming 
is conducted without irrigation; to such the irrigation problem seems 
too large to compass, and so all the water that might be supplied 
through individual effort has not been taken out, and that which has 
been handled has not always been made the most advantageous. 

It is likely that if a balance were struck between the irrigated and 
non-irrigated farms of Cascade county that the lands under dry farm- 
ing would exceed those that are irrigated. 

Six years ago it was found as the result of a careful canvass by 
the business men's board of trade of Great Falls that there was im- 
ported into the city from other states, notably North Dakota, almost 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 45 



a half-million dollars worth of farm products for consumption in Great 
Falls alone, not a single article of which could not be produced within 
the limits of Cascade county. 

The Eastern farmer from sections with tv/enty-five inches of rain- 
fall and upwards comes to Montana bringing Eastern methods, turns 
prairie sod two and one-half to three inches with two or three light 
horses and a small plow, in the proper season, fines down the soil to 
this depth, seeds his crop and as a result, unless the annual eighteen 
inches of rainfall, is largely concentrated during the ninety days re- 
quired to secure a crop, is doing well to recover his seed. On the other 
hand, the experienced mountaineer provides himself with a plow of 
deep draught and broad cut, to it is attached from four to seven horses 
(horseflesh is cheap in Montana), inverts a furrow from ten to thirteen 
inches deep, cuts this absolutely to pieces with the spring-tooth har- 
row and the disk harrow and cultivates its surface to garden tilth with 
a Scotch harrow. 

The following spring, perhaps in the month of February or March, 
depending on the earliness of the season, he seeds liberally to wheat 
(oats and barley doing better sown in April or May), using a drill 
which plants the seed from three and one-half to five inches below the 
surface, following the drill, if not too wet, with a heavy land roller, and 
behind this cross harrowing with a Scotch harrow, the result is that 
the seed grain germinates evenly and quickly, and before the drying 
spring winds the surface of the ground is completely covered with 
a rank lush growth of vegetation; this in turn prevents evaporation 
of the moisture stored in the generous depth of the furrow from the 
snows of the previous winter, supplemented by early spring rains. 

Lands thus farmed v/ill in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred ex- 
ceed in yield that of the average of the lands in the United States, and 
should there — as is often the case — come from one-half to one inch 
of rainfall just as the grain is filling, the result is a bumper crop from 
200 to 300 per cent in excess of the normal yield of the United States. 
The farmer in Montana has an infinite advantage with respect to rain- 
fall. As certainly as the seasons roll, the rains, except in exceptionally 
high lying mountain valleys, are over for the summer by July 15th, 
and the next ninety days may be considered as fair weather days in 
which the varied farm operations of haying, havesting and fall plowing 
may be conducted without dread of falling weather to affect his results. 

This is a universal financial advantage in respect to the farm 
laborer, teams, etc., as their ability to labor is measured by the days 
of the calendar, and plans do not have to be made to supplement the 
time lost in unfavorable weather. This, too, has much to do with the 
quality of the harvested product, be it hay or grain. 

A very customary sight in the grain regions of Montana is to see 
grain sacked and corded up the same as cord wood and left in the field 
where the machine stood, there to remain until such time as the farmer 
can find time to haul it to market. 

In no region in the United States is the proportion of the cost 
of granaries and hay barns so small in comparison to the value of other 
farm improvements as it is in Montana. This is a great saving to the 
farmer, for while it may be a comparatively small tax on the re- 



46 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



sources of the avei'age American wheat grower to house his wheat 
crop, averaging thirteen bushels per acre, the cost to the Montana 
farmer for providing storage rooms for wheat which v/ill average from 
twenty-five to forty-five bushels per acre is very much greater. 

The American of all folk is imbued with the idea of securing some- 
thing for nothing. During the past year, more than a million and a half 
acres of government lands were homesteaded in the State of North 
Dakota. At this rate of entry it will be but a short time until free 
lands in North Dakota will all have been taken. In five of the oldest 
counties, Pembina, Grand Forks, Traill, Steele and Cass, there is an 
average of only 274 acres government lands open to entry. When these 
lands are occupied the irresistible flow of immigration will be on and 
into Montana, and, in addition to this population, who insist on free 
land as a condition to settlement, there will be hundreds and thousands 
of the younger members of old farming families of the older Eastern 
states who have made and saved money on the old farm, but who 
cannot afford the relatively dear farm lands of the older states; these, 
attracted by the marvelous conditions, with respect to climate, fertility 
of soil and fruit possibility, will come to the older portions of the state 
and secure by purchase, improved lands. These productive lands will 
be better farmed, with the result that still better returns will be se- 
cured, more costly and desirable buildings will be erected, and the 
state made richer by the natural increment to the taxable wealth. 

Much preliminary time ha,s been spent by the Commission in work- 
ing under the Cary arid land grant of one million acres to the states 
reclaiming the same. By the terms of this act, the state is practically 
authorized to place these lands under irrigation, provided the cost of 
such operation does not exceed the value of the land. 

There are vast areas of Cascade county eligible to such improve- 
ment. 

The Cascade farmer will always be certain of a demand for his 
produce. The county lies admirably for transportation of the produce 
of the farm to market. Great Falls can be reached in a day's drive 
from any part of the county with a heavily loaded wagon drawn by 
a good team. 

The monthly pay roll puts t-he farmer on to a cash basis, as he can 
always realize cash for his wares from the city dealer or consumer. 
For eight months out of the year the natural highways are unexcelled. 
Building material (except lumber) is abundant. Much of the county 
is underlaid with coal measures, carrying a fine vein of good 
bituminous coal, and a full supply, good in quality, abundant in quan- 
tity and cheap in price is the result. 

The climate is agreeable and the general good health of the county 
Is in large part attributable to the mild, dry atmosphere. 

In no other county of the state has farm improvement been so 
constant and uninterrupted. It is assured a bright future. Great 
Falls has been the greatest wool market in the state. 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 47 



CHOTEAU COUNTY. 

Choteau is among the large counties of the state of large counties. 
It forms the central northern boundary line (lying nearly midway 
across the state for 170 miles), and its total area is 15,380 square miles. 
For years Fort Benton, its county seat, was the financial and business 
center of Montana; fur traders having here located soon after the 
tour of Lewis and Clarke through the state in 1803 and 1895. 

■ Fort Benton is the head of navigation on the Missouri river, al- 
though no steamboat has ascended to this point since the completion 
of the Great Northern railway in 1887. 

The county is almost entirely plains country, it being on the great 
northern plateau of the Missouri river. This stream in its great 
northern course reaches almost the center of the county, makes an 
abrupt turn to the south and east, then pursues an almost easterly 
course along perhaps half of the breadth of the county, forming for 
this distance its southern boundary. For almost the entire length of 
this stream within the boundaries of Choteau it has worn for itself 
so deep a channel, and the draws or coulees leading down from the high 
lying plateaus (which are thereby drained) are so steep and abrupt, 
that it is well nigh an engineering impossibility to divert the water 
from this river onto the neighboring plateaus. This might be accom- 
plished by damming the stream to the height of the immediate banks 
and then conducting the water through canals onto the lower lying lev- 
els, but as stated the draws are so numerous and so many expensive 
flumes would be required to carry the water over these that the cost 
precludes such an attempt. 

There are, however, some of the leading tributaries of the Mis- 
souri to be found in this county; the main ones are the Teton, the 
Marias and Milk rivers. These have their rise in the main range of 
the Rockies not far distant from the western boundaries of the county, 
and are very favorable streams for the exercise of engineering skill. 

Choteau county stands to-day for the leading stock county of the 
state, and more cattle and sheep are to be found within its boundaries 
than in any of the other counties. That this is so is owing to a com- 
bination of circumstances; while there are great climatic changes iu 
short periods of time within the territory named, yet, on the whole, 
the winters are not excessively cold. 

Its general plane is nearer level than that of any other similar 
area in the state, and the flood waters originating largely from the 
winter snow, reinforced by the spring rains, do not pass off so rapidly, 
hence the surface of the plains is usually wet down to a good depth, 
with corresponding benefit to vegetation. In the early days Corinne, 
Utah, and Fort Benton were entrepots to Montana:, the former being the 
nearest railway station on the Union Pacific railway and the latter the 
head of navigation on the Missouri. Freighters could give convincing 
testimony that the northern plains were everlastingly water-soaked 
and water-logged in the months of .Tune and July; so much so. that 
trail teams were sometimes compelled to go into camp and await the 



48 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

action of drying winds. These outfits usually carried a set of jack- 
screws to be used both to grease wagon axles and to afford means for 
prying the hopelessly mired wagons out of the mud. The soil is (much 
of it) called adobe soil, possessing the peculiarity of clinging when 
wet or damp, to any object with which it comes in contact. The 
writer has seen a light buggy, hopelessly wheel-locked by the vast 
accumulation of clay that adhered to the wheels, until the mass 
assumed such proportions as to become wedged between the wheels 
and the bed of the vehicle. This is largely owing to the absence of 
sand in the soil; it also tends to prevent the rapid evaporation of 
moisture. These peculiar moisture conditions, when considered with 
the fertility of the soil (it being especially rich in nitrogen, potash and 
phosphoric acid), explain very obviously the attraction to live stock 
found in the abundant plant growth in ordinary seasons. 

These rich and nutritive grasses, sun cure and make quite as good 
stock food as the best of hay cured under artificial conditions. Cattle 
go onto these lush, natural meadows, covered with tender, succulent 
range grasses, early in the spring, after they have been on short com- 
mons for many weeks, many of them being perilously near that con- 
dition known to Eastern and Southern stock men as* "on the lift" 
(namely, so poor and emaciated that when they lie down, they require 
assistance to regain their feet), their digestive apparatus no doubt im- 
paired by the lack of the right kind of food, the hair staring from 
exposure to the inclement rain and snow storms of the late winter 
months, almost every bone in evidence. The young and tender green 
grass is at first relaxing in its effects, but they speedily regain their 
strength and flesh and often by the middle of July are in prime beef 
condition. This flesh grows firm and hard as the summer waxes and 
wanes, and by the time frosts come they are in prime condition for 
the Eastern markets and stand the long railway shipments much bet- 
ter than would be supposed. 

There are physical characteristics of the country to be taken into 
account in the matter of selection of what would naturally be sup- 
posed to be the bleakest and most inclement region in Montana. It 
is a well known fact that well-fed cattle will never succumb to cold; 
it is the animal weakened by starvation which falls a victim to the bliz- 
zard. 

These high-lying plains are wind swept as are but few regions 
of the continent. This wind is the key to the cattle and sheep situa- 
tion. The snow which one year with another falls to a depth of 
eighteen inches, would be an insuperable bar to the winter range busi- 
ness, cattle will not paw away the snow to get at the herbage lying 
underneath (in this respect horses are much more independent than 
cattle), and unless the major portion of the range was cleaned of 
snow they could not get to feed. Then, too, this region is frequently 
visited by Chinook winds, that will lick up snow twelve inches deep 
in a night and lay bare the plains; a most singular fact with the 
Chinook wind is that but little moisture is left on the ground, it being 
literally borne away on the wings of the wind. 

This county has within its boundaries, in addition to the three 
named important streams, perhaps 100 tributaries of the same. Many 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 49 



of them flow into the Missouri, and it is especially the case that 
these streams cut a channel down through the alluvial soil and drift 
gravel in the same way that the main stream has done. These deep^ 
-cut channels, together with the side streams and draws tributary to 
the smaller streams, make many so-called "cut banks" and "bad lands" 
formations. In these oftentimes the banks have as acute angles and 
as perpendicular walls as does a barn and these miniature canyons 
^re a great protection from the wind storms, to cattle that drift therein 
10 escape the severity of the storm. 

The best agricultural lands are found along the valleys and the 
smaller streams, notably those of the Teton, Marias and Milk rivers. 

Already large partnership ditches are being operated along the 
Teton and Milk rivers, and others are projected to be constructed in 
the near future. The area of lands apparently adapted to irrigation is 
greater than is usually supposed, and this fact coupled with the re- 
markable productiveness of the soil, once it is placed under irriga- 
tion and the proper system of cultivation, has the effect of doubling 
and often quadrupling the farm areas, as such acres produce double at 
times and fourfold the usual farm acre of the United States. 

Then, too, the broken general character of the country, by draws 
and coulees, which are nothing but wet weather water channels, give 
the best of opportunity to reservoir the surplus spring floods and to 
hold them back until the moisture will give the best results. 

Farmers and ranchmen are beginning to study closely the pos- 
sibilities of thus storing water and to take advantage of the many 
favorable locations Choteau county gives for crop production. 

There is a growing conviction in the minds of stockmen, es- 
pecially to flock masters, that it is a prudent measure to provide for- 
age for the stock, sufiicient in amount to tide them over the oc- 
casional stormy periods, when from depth of snow or when it is crusted 
they are unable to rustle feed for themselves. This necessity is the 
ground work for extensive farm development, and already in many 
parts of the range country the stockman and the ranchman, formerly 
"at outs" with each other, are now working in harmony, the consid- 
eration being the financial relation existing between them. 

So long as the vast bulk of the range country is practically above 
available water supply, by any present system, there seems to be no 
apparent ground for conflict over the occupancy of land. 

So well organized are the cattlemen, and so perfect the system 
whereby the branded animal (no matter whether gathered by the 
owner or by another a thousand miles from the home range), is sold 
for the benefit of its owner, who receives the pay for the same through 
the stock association. This has done much to allay the friction be- 
tween interested parties, and so long as there is more feed upon the 
range than can be annually consumed, just so long will peace and 
harmony prevail and vast sums accrue to owners by handling live stock 
under the open range system. 

The country of the upper Missouri plateau has one great ad- 
vantage over either the mountain i-egion or that of the Great Plains 
country far to the east and south. Spring comes much earlier and it 
is possible to open up farm operations, oftentimes in February. This 



50 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

is owing to the winds, that frequently sweep the fall plowed fields 
bare of snow as soon as it falls, or if such be not the case, they are 
subjected to the effects of the chinook. Fields thus worked and 
sown are green with growing grain many times before the Dakota 
fields can be touched, and the ground is covered with a rank growth 
prior to the May and June rains. 

These come just as the growing grain needs moisture, and falling 
as it does on well advanced vegetation it does not waste from evapora- 
tion as it would where grain had but just sprouted. So marked are 
these effects that the average of the yield of the well-tilled unirrigated 
grain fields of Northern Montana is far in advance of these of the 
country at large. The use of water for irrigation has but fairly been 
started in Choteau county and there is certain to be a large develop- 
ment there of this interest. 

Wheat, oats and barley succeed remarkably well, the leading hay 
crop as yet is blue joint, with timothy as a good second. Alfalfa, how- 
ever, is destined to be the great forage crop. Under irrigation this 
is an enormous yielder, giving from four to seven tons per acre, and 
where the la,nd is artificially watered, no man can afford to harvest but 
a single hay crop per annum. 

It requires a magnificent yield of the annual hay crops, such as 
timothy, blue joint or red top to equal one and one-half tons, and when 
it is possible to treble or quadruple such yields by a forage crop which 
shows by chemical analysis to be far more stimulating to the soil than 
animal manure, it is folly to adhere to a system which has these for a 
basis. Then again, timothy is one of the most exhaustive crops upon 
land, and while the legumes (and clovers and peas) are adding abund- 
antly of the most exhaustive chemical fertilizers — nitrogen — to the 
soil, the lands which are naturally very productive are steadily growing 
poorer under the depleting crop, timothy. 

That certain poorly informed consumers of forage in the leading 
markets of Montana do not like to feed the clovers, and hence have 
affected their sale, should make no real difference to the farmer who 
is growing hay, for no matter what the price be that he receives, he 
cannot afford to 'sell off his hay except it be fed out upon the land on 
which it was produced; otherwise it is but a question of time, when the 
land becomes so impoverished as to be valueless for crop production, 
the injudicious cropping of the lands of the South Atlantic states, where 
it is estimated by good authority that 8 per cent of the total area of 
certain states have been abandoned from being so impoverished as to 
not be worth cultivation. 

There is but little reason why lands should not be as valuable 
for all a,gricultural purposes at the end of a century of continuous crop- 
ping as when first redeemed from nature and placed under cultivation. 

CUvSTER COUNTY. 

Custer county is the leading county in size in this state of large 
counties. Its eastern and southern boundaries, form relatively a 
half and a third of the eastern and southern boundaries of Montana, 
and its area is not far from 27,000 square miles. It is bisected into 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 



two irregular parts by the Yellowstone river, and within the boundaries 
of this county more than twenty named water courses find their way 
into this river. Of these Powder and Tongue rivers are of great 
length, the others in large part originating within the county. 

The county was named for the late Gen. Custer, who knew It well 
and whose last sad campaign was made v/ithin its boundaries. His 
remains lie under the monument erected on the Custer battle field. 

Custer has not been recognized as a prominent agricultural 
county of the state, simply that its early history was identified with 
the open range live stock industry, and in the early days no attention 
whatever was paid to soil culture in connection with the live stock 
industry. This condition is rapidly changing and men are learning 
that it pays to effect live stock insurance by putting up hay for calves 
and weak cows through that part of the winter when snow may be 
too deep or too crusted to permit open grazing. In the early days of 
Montana, the only enclosures to be noted were round-up corrals or 
possibly a few acres found around the dooryard of the home ranch; 
otherwise the herds of cattle and horses, roamed the state over at their 
ov.-n sweet will. 

Post and rail fencing was expensive, costing $1.25 per rod, and 
was short lived. With the advent of the railways and sheep, barb 
wire was introduced, and this being followed by land leasing, it has 
grown to be the thing to fence extensive areas of public and private 
lands. Much of this is untilled, the object of fencing being to provide 
winter pasture for stock. TJie difference between open range and 
fenced pastures is very marked and may be noted for miles and miles, 
long past the point at which the restraining fences are discernible by 
the naked eye. 

In a way the beginning of fencing has been the beginning of 
homes of the small ranchman and farmer. If pastures could thus ' 
guarded, crops and meadows likewise could be protected from the r,i' 
devouring flocks and herds, and it was thus that farming has worked 
itself into the heart of the best grazing portions of the state. The old- 
time conflict betv/een the big cattle outfits and the man of small means 
is practically ended. The owners of thousands of cattle and sheep 
learn that the care of their flocks tax them to the utmost, and that 
they can to good advantage contract with the farmer to grow hay at an 
agreed price per ton, to be fed out in winter, when feed is an object. 

Reciprocity of interest is thus accomplishing that which promised 
to be an eternal difference productive of quarrels, dissensions and 
bloodshed. 

The application of water in irrigation has shown that Custer 
county soil is responsive in cereal production, and that for root and 
forage crops it is remarkably well adapted. Alfalfa is destined to be 
the keystone to the new agricultural arch that is rapidly bein^ 
erected. Custer farmers readily secure three and four crops of alfalfa, 
and he who has forty acres of this legume to the man and team is in- 
sured an abundance of work from the 15th of May until the close of 
the season, as the development period of alfalfa in these fertile lands 
under irrigation is from fourteen to twenty-one days, and about as 
rapidly as a cutting can be made, cured, stacked and the land ir- 
rigated, the field is again ready for the mower. 



52 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

This section of the state offers great promise for sugar beet 
culture. The soil and climate are exactly adapted, and the season for 
sugar manuracture is ample in length. 

Horticulture in the vicinity of Miles City is yielding good re- 
turns, and unquestionably it is only a question of time v.'hen the 
denjand for fruit will be met from the home orchards and plantations. 

An extensive United States military post is maintained at Fort 
Keogh, four miles from Miles City, while at Miles City is located the 
Reform School and the United States land office. This gives good 
opportunity for information relative to the selection of lands from the 
public domain. 

There is much of opportunity in this county to warrant the 
attention and investigation of the home seeker. 

DAWSON COUNTY. 

Dawson county lies in the apex formed by the Missouri and Yel- 
lowstone rivers, a small part of the county lying south of the Yellow- 
stone river and forming a part of the eastern boundary of Montana. It 
contains 13,194 square miles, with a population of 2,056. Much of the 
county consists of high, rolling plateaus, strictly pastoral lands and 
adapted to grazing. Perhaps twenty small streams empty into the 
Yellowstone from within the the confines of Dawson, and the bottoms 
along those, together with the Yellowstone bottoms offer the only op- 
portunity for practicing irrigation. 

Remoteness from market is a bar to agricultural development be- 
yond such as comes from a combination of summer ranging, and winter 
feeding of stock; this can be successfully prosecuted to the full 
capacity of the production of the soil; which is adapted to the suc- 
cessful growth of the cereals, grasses, clovers and fruits. 

The altitude is about 2,000 feet above sea level, and is the lowest 
in Montana, rendering it possible to produce anything which is grown 
In the upper Missouri valley. This county will never be densely pop- 
ulated, except along the Missouri and Yellowstone bottoms, and the 
streams leading thereto. The interior of the county will always be one 
of the great grazing regions of Montana and the stock industry its lead- 
ing one. 

A steady change in methods is in progress, and the greater the 
herds, the larger will be the demand for forage for winter feeding. 
Montanans are rapidly learning that it is the height of folly to grow the 
raw product, i. e., the steer or mutton and to ship directly off the sum- 
mer range, sending them down to the corn fields of the Western states 
to be metamorphosed into the prime, juicy cuts of beef and mutton. 
Such procedure is ruinous to the small Montana farmer, as it gives him 
no opportunity to market his feed, which is infinitely superior for the 
purpose to that grown in the humid states. It is not only bad for the 
farmer, but the loss from shrinkage in weights incident to the 1,500- 
mile car trip of the animal directly off grass, is very great and can 
practically all be saved when the animals are in prime condition 
from a diet of well cured hay and grain. 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 53 

Then the saving in roughage. If the good, bright straw now burned 
by thousands of tons in Montana could be fed it would be a great saving 
to the farmers of the state, and better than all will be the beneficial 
effects to the soil of the added fertility incident to the winter feeding 
of 200,000 steers and 1,000,000 of sheep now annually sent out of the 
state to be fed elsewhere. When this becomes common procedure, tens 
of thousands of fertile acres in Dawson county, along the larger and 
smaller streams, will be reclaimed and made to produce bounteously 
of stock feeding material. 

DEER LODGE COUNTY. 

This county is extremely irregular in shape, is nearly 150 miles in 
length from north to south, and at its widest point is sixty miles and 
contains a trifle over 4,000 square miles. Mountain ranges have much 
to do with county boundary irregularities. 

Travel is up and down the valleys of the water courses, and it is 
only upon emergency that the ranges, tov/ering from 1,500 to 3,500 feet 
above water courses, are crossed. 

In early days the valley of the Deer Lodge river and the willow 
thickets and copses bordering it and its tributaries were frequented 
in the winter season by white-tail deer in such numbers as to cause the 
Indians to term it the Deer Lodge. The adaptation of the country to 
the wants of the wild animals fit it likewise for domestic herds. 

This county is a prominent sheep range, there being within its 
confines 100,000 sheep. 

The establishment of the Lewis and Clark forest reserve cuts off 
nearly the northern half of the county for forest reserve, and as 
sheep and goats are not permitted to range thereon, this will have a 
tendency to curtail the development of the sheep industry. It is very 
hard to secure reliable data as to the cattle industry. These are on 
the range the major portion of the year, and not always where the 
inspector can secure a reliable tally; but there are large holdings of 
cattle in this valley. Originally, though lying comparatively high, it 
v/as a great grass country, but many irrigated farms have ceased 
to produce, simply that they are in the wake of the tailings from the 
great smelters located at Anaconda. 

These tailings are pulverized waste ore. from which all of value has 
been chemically or mechanically removed, and the waste flows off 
down stream out of the way of the operators. So extensive has been 
the deposition of debris in this case, that this smelting company has 
acquired titles by purchase to thousands of acres of previously fertile 
land. It is understood the injury is caused by coating the land (oft- 
entimes a deposit several feet in depth) with a silt so fine as to hermet- 
ically seal the land to the influences of air and moisture. Then, of 
course, plant food would be present in such material in very limited 
quantities; spite of this, vast quantities of the blue joint and timothy 
hay are harvested annually in the county, and it will always be a prom- 
inent pastoral section. 

The city of Anaconda, the county seat, has a large and growing 
population. Here are located the smelters of the great Anaconda 



54 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

Amalgamated Mining Co., with a capital of $75,000,000, which give 
eniployment to thousands of men, and these in turn afford a fine mar- 
ket for farm produce. From mining sources within the county there 
are produced values of a quarter million dollars annually. 

A future source of gi'eat wealth to this county will be found 
in her standing timber. Now that this has been reserved beyond the 
reach of the lumberman, it will be harvested economically, prudently 
and judiciously, and the state and county will be infinitely better off 
in the long run for such reservation. . 

In favorable locations along the lower lying valleys the hardier 
fruits and small fruits are succeeding well, and give promise of adding 
to the attractiveness of the country home. 

FLATHEAD COUNTY. 

This county was named from the Flathead tribe of Indians, the 
most enlightened and progressive of all the tribes. Flathead is the 
northwestern county of Montana. Its population in 1890 was 5,000, 
and its area about 7,000 square miles; hence there is no immediate 
danger of its people being crowded for room. The county is moun- 
tainous in parts, the main range of the Rockies forming its eastern 
boundary, paralleled in the southeastern part of the county by the 
Kootenai mountains; the Mission range forms the southwestern 
boundary; on the northwest is the Purcell ravge. In the south cen- 
tral part of the county is Flathead lake, the largest body of water in 
the Rocky mountain system. Its length is about fifty miles with a 
maximum width of twenty-five miles; it is very deep, and so large a 
body of water exercises a powerful influence upon vegetation, this is 
particularly true as to spring and fall frosts. No data of tbe United 
States ?:eographical survey are available, but we have reason to 
believe that there is no other county in Montana or in the United 
States that has passing through its borders so large a volume of water. 

The Yakt river crosses the extreme western part of the county, 
flowing into the Kootenai, which is a very large stream. Entering the 
same stream near Kalispell (the county seat, which is quite centrally 
located) are the Maple and White Fish, these being tributaries to the 
north fork of the Flathead river, which is joined by the south fork 
of the same in the near vicinity of Columbia falls, twelve miles north 
of Kalispell ; while entering near the head of Flathead lake is the Big 
Fork or Swan river. Flathead lake is an expansion of the river of the 
same name, and to the Eastern tourist these streams are all very strid- 
ing from their grandeur and magnitude. The waters of this county 
carry the color peculiar to Niagara on the rapids above and below the 
falls, and this deep sea green color, coupled with the depth, width and 
rapidity of current, make of them mighty water courses indeed. 

The agricultural lands of the county lie mainly in the central part 
and on either side of the Flathead river; the valley proper is about 
fifty miles in length by twenty-five in width. One peculiarity of this 
valley is that much of the finest of the agricultural land is or was 
covered with very heavy pine, and as this is cleared away in the 
commercial use of the timber, which is of the best in quality, the 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 



55 



lands are rapidly brought under cultivation and produce amazing crops 
of the cereals, roots, grasses and fruits. 

The climate of Flathead county is unlike that of any other part 
of Montan?. ; surrounded as it is by lofty ranges of mountains, some of 
which are thrown in a northerly and southerly direction across the 
county, and lying (the level lands) at an altitude ranging from 2,300 
to 2.800 feet above sea level, the conditions are very much more 
humid than are to be found elsewhere in the state. The snowfall is 
much deeper in winter and lies longer upon the ground. This county 
has never been used as a winter range country and as a consequence, 
settlement by small ranchers has been more active than upon the cat- 
tle and sheep ranges to the east. 

Again, the rainfall is usvially greater in the growing season than 
in the case of sections of the state lying higher and with less moun- 
tainous environment. 




R.MSEI) IN THE FLATUK.X I). 



Something, however, has been accomplished in the line of irriga- 
tion, and where tried the results have been most gratifying. It 
might be presumed by the uninformed that the location of this county 
so far to the northward would make it inclement. Such is not the 
case. The coldest weather experienced there in '98 and '99 was 18 
degrees below zero, and this e.xtreme lasted but four days. 

Whether it be the ameliorating influences of mountain environ- 
ment, the prevalence of the chinook winds, or the comparative near- 
ness of the Pacific Ocean, it is a fact that winter climatic conditions 



56 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

are very much milder generally in Montana than is the case in any 
of the country lying in the same parallels to the eastward. Proof 
of this is given to the horticulturist in the character of the fruit suc- 
ceeding here. Plums, not those of the Chickasaw type found In the 
Mississippi valley, but the varieties common to California and New 
York, the gages, egg plums, damsons and prunes are doing remarkably 
well, whilst cherries, pears and peaches give abundant promise of suc- 
cessful fruiting. 

Projects will in time be planned and performed which will place 
1,500 square miles of the arable lands of this county under irrigation, 
and thus the productive capacity of the soil be increased at least 33% 
per cent. They will be costly, however, owing to the magnitude of the 
streams from which water must be taken, it will be decidedly more 
expensive in diverting the water from the streams in passing canyons, 
and over broken lands and these operations w^ill require the hearty 
co-operation of the farmers and the capitalist as well. 

The neighborhood of the vast mining districts of British Columbia, 
as well as those of the county, which are most promising, both in the 
precious metals and of coal of most superior quality, will create a 
favorable market for agricultural products. This county is at- present 
traversed only by the lines of the Great Northern railway and while 
the Flathead farms are 700 miles distant from the mining regions 
of Butte, Anaconda and Helena, this line with commendable foresight 
IS giving to its farmers a freight rate which permits them to enter 
these markets on the same footing with farmers not 100 miles distant. 

The Flathead and the Kootenai valleys have great agricultural 
futures ahead of them and are destined in the near future to become 
wonderful producers. 

FERGUS COUNTY. 

Fergus county occupies the geographical center of Montana and a 
large part of its area is known better by its local name, the Judith 
basin. 

This is the banner sheep county of the state. For many years this 
was a leading cow county, but the dry season of 1890 and the encroach- 
ments of the sheep men caused the large cattle herds to be moved 
northward across the Missouri river,, into the extensive plateau lying 
between the Missouri and Milk rivers, so that the cattle now on the 
range in this county represent the herds of the small rancher rather 
than those of the big cattle outfits. It has also been found profitable 
to fence extensive areas of this section so as to save the grass for 
winter pasturage. This custom of protecting the range by fencing 
is growing to be very common in all of the open range country in Mon- 
tana and is a great aid to the range industry. Many stockmen turn: 
cattle out on the open range early in the spring, as soon as calves are 
branded, and permit them to run at large until the beef round-up in 
the fall, at which time late calves are branded and cows and calves 
brought inside the fenced ranges for the winter. 

An excellent idea of the utility of this plan may be gained by ob- 
serving the difference in the feed or grass within the fences as compared, 



i^ 




58 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

with the open or unfenced areas. So marked is this difference in the 
size and density of the plant growth that one can observe the difference 
for miles, the lands which have been open to range stock through the 
summer look brown and destitute of vegetation, while the fenced tracts 
show a luxuriant growth of vegetation, sun-cured to a rich golden 
color. 

Both cattle and sheep men pursue the plan of fencing for winter 
pasture, though it is more difficult to restrain sheep within fence than 
cattle, and the loss to wool is not inconsiderable where sheep are ex- 
posed to barbed wire fencing. Fergus county is the only Montana 
county not traversed by a railway, and this has had its effect upon the 
agricultural development, as the distances over which farm products 
would have to be transported v/ere prohibitive. This also has 
had its effect upon the extension of the stock industry of the 
county, as it is quite a common practice to drive sheep from fifty to 
one hundred miles to the railway shearing pens to save the wool 
haul. 

Cattle and horses are also easily moved on fool, and so the 
production of the cereal and forage crop have been only such as 
can be handled in home consumption. 

Again, while Fergus county has a larger area of practically level 
land than any other Montana county, it being a high level plateau, the 
supply of water is in no wise commensurate to the requirements, were 
all the arable lands to be brought under cultivation. The only avail- 
able source of water supply, other than such as could be reservoired 
from the mountain gulches, being the Judith river and its tributaries. 
The former is a stream of considerable length, perhaps 100 miles, and 
it frequently happens that all the water is diverted, leaving the bed 
bare and dry, within the first 25 miles from its head. 

Below the mouths of Spring and Warm Springs creeks there is a 
large volume of water supply by these streams and by seepage from 
these points to the mouth of the Missouri there is a large supply of 
available water and extensive areas of desirable farm lands, that can 
be easily irrigated. 

GALLATIN COUNTY. 

Gallatin county lies well to the southwestern corner of the state, 
there being only two counties, Madison and Beaverhead, between it 
and Idaho. It forms a portion of the southern boundary of the state 
and for a short distance a part of the northern boundary of the Yel- 
lowstone National Park. Originally one of the largest counties of the 
state, it has been divided and subdivided by legislative enactment un- 
til but a tithe of its former dimensions remain, but the one central 
thought has always permeated divisional legislation, that of preserv- 
ing intact that matchless area of farm lands, the Gallatin valley. 
This is not a large tract; perhaps 1,200 square miles would comprise 
the valley proper and the surrounding bench land, while the remain- 
ing 1,095 square miles of its total area is composed of mountain ranges 
(rich in coal and timber), and more valuable agriculturally as con- 
stituting a continuous line of fencing 2,000 feet high around the east- 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 



59 




■■•i'T<l 







<j£iiii^. 




60 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

ern, southern and western boundaries, while the horseshoe hills with 
an average altitude of 1,000 feet give valuable protection from the raw 
winds which sweep over all unprotected Western areas. But more 
important by far is the mountain environment in the matter of in- 
suring an adequate supply of water from the winter snows, which are 
here conserved until the heat of mid-summer releases the moisture 
in time to be of greatest benefit to vegetation. 

If a giant left hand were to be planted upon the map, the point 
of union with the wrist at the three forks of the Missouri, the fingers 
widely spread apart and the middle fingers pointing due south, the 
relation of the various main heads of the Missouri, would be quite 
well represented, the thumb standing for the Jefferson, the index 
finger for the Madison, and the middle finger for the true Gallatin, 
while the remaining two would stand for the East Gallatin and main 
tributary, Bridger creek. Imagine that the palm of the hand spanned 
across thirty miles of plow land and that the middle finger was 100 
miles in length, the others being in due proportion and a fairly cor- 
rect idea would be obtained of the relation of the water supply to the 
tillable lands of Gallatin county. 

While there are older tilled areas in Montana than the Gallatin, 
there are none in which there is so much to show for agricultural 
factors in deciding its relative agricultural progress has been the very 
choice and desirable grazing lands and the absence of any of the 
precious minerals in the mountains in its close proximity. This 
has necessitated the attention of its settlers to farming and stock 
growing. Then, too, for many years a large cavalry post at Fort Ellis 
was maintained, and this in its day called for immense quantities of 
hay and grain. Later the extension of the main and branch lines of 
the Northern Pacific railway into the thriving cities of Helena and 
Butte brought within 100 miles of the valley two of the most desirable 
markets for agricultural produce within the state. The first grain 
grown in the Gallatin was in 1864 by Geo. J. Thomas; the following 
year John W. Nelson procured some seed wheat from the Bitter Root 
and from this seeding produced 250 bushels of soft wheat. Soon 
thereafter it was noted that oats succeeded equally well, and so 
actively has grain farming been prosecuted that the Gallatin valley has 
easily stood at the head as the source of supply for grain for years. 

Coover & McAdam built a custom mill at Bozeman in 1865. 

In 1867 Penwell & Co. built the Union mill. 

In 1866 Judge A. Davis and others built a mill at Gallatin City. 

In 1884 flour milling was commercially instituted by Nelson Story 
and in 1892 the Bozeman Milling Company was organized; these fur- 
nish market for 2,500 bushels of grain per day, and with the introduc- 
tion of of the latest improved milling machinery, the production of 
hard spring wheat has been greatly augmented. 

In 1893 extended tests and analyses were made of the two-rowed 
barley produced in Gallatin county and its quality found to be such 
that a special bulletin was issued by the oflicial organ of the brewers 
of Berlin. So much notoriety was achieved by this advertising that 
the crops of 1896 and 1897 were absorbed by German brewers at a 
price almost double that of the best barleys of the East. 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 61 



The impetus thus given to grain production has called for the use 
of all desirable irrigable lands in the valley and the area on which 
spring-grown grains can be produced has been materially enlarged 
by relegating all winter grains, wheat and rye to the foot-hill farms, or 
high plateaus, which, while lying above the territory to which water 
can be profitably conveyed artificially, still receive sufficient moisture 
from the more abundant snow and rainfall of winter and early spring 
to mature exceedingly profitable grain crops. Upon these dry farm 
lands summer fallowing in alternate seasons is practiced to excellent 
advantage. The normal fall of the land from the mouth of the main 
canyons of Gallatin valley, Bridger, Bozeman, Middle creek, Cotton- 
wood, Bear creek and the West Gallatin to the Three Forks of the 
Missouri is about seventy-five feet to the mile, and water consequently 
passes rapidly over the fields. 

This has taught the farmers the importance of fitting the land in 
the best possible mechanical condition for the application of water. 
Lands are largely summer fallowed, i. e., summer plowed and it is 
the practice of the best farmers to cultivate these fallowed fields dur- 
ing the summer, some using the disk and others a weed exter- 
minator; the result is that in spring the land is rapidly reduced 
to a mellow, friable condition, and much pains taken to bring the 
surface of the fields to a uniform plane or grade. Various implements 
are used — clod crushers, graders and levelers. Leaving dead furrows, 
back furrows or the previous year's ditches apparent on the surface 
of the grounds is never practiced; these interfere materially with fu- 
ture irrigation and detract in general from the appearance of the grain 
fields. In my experience of nearly a quarter of a century in the great 
grain farms o* Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota and the Dakotas, it is my 
opinion that very much better farm methods are employed in the 
irrigated West than in the states named. 

Evidently in prehistoric times the present arable lands of Gallatin 
county were under water, the dam confining the same being not far 
from the pi'esent head of the Missouri river, near the town of 
Three Forks. As the chasm in the rocky barrier was rent, to permit 
the escape of the waters forming this immense inland sea, the action 
of the waters was more positive in cutting to bed rock near the point 
of exit. As one progresses northward from Three Forks, the depth of 
the alluvial soil increases until the most fertile soils of the valley, and 
those of greatest depth, are encountered about midway between Three 
Forks and the Gallatin range. These lands are traversed by numerous 
streams, prominent among which are Bear. Cottonwood, Middle, Boze- 
man (or Sour Dough) and Rocky. Smaller streams are Bear canyon, 
Lime Kiln and Leverich; these streams all rise in the northern slopes 
of the Gallatin range, which has an average altitude of about 5.000 feet. 
The divide between the Gallatin and the Yellowstone is very sharp, 
and the snow deposited upon the north slope of the Gallatin range 
either falls in heavily-timbered regions, or else in sharply broken 
country, with the result that it does not melt so rapidly as if it were 
on high levels or on a northern slope. 

Stteams rising on these slopes seldom attain their maximum 
height of run off until about the 10th or the 15th of July, a time in 



62 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

which irrigation is at its height. This results in an abundance of 
water for the first irrigation of grain, hay and clovers, and as the 
general average for irrigation periods in this valley is known to be 
about 11/2 times, it may readily be seen that the water supply of the 
major' portion of the valley is more than ample in a season of normal 
moisture precipitation. Then, too, it is desirable at the time of the 
greatest irrigation activity that there be such a supply of water in 
the main streams as to equal the carrying capacity of the ditches 
taken out therefrom, as under these conditions it is possible for one 
to accomplish double what they would if working with an insulRcient 
bead of water. 

That this has not always been to the best advantage of the soil, 
is shown by the rapid silting over of rocky swales or sloughs. Many 
of these old water channels, from two to five rods in width, traverse 
the country between the main streams and have been used by farmers 
as waste water channels. The beds of these are usually composed of 
small boulders, gravel and sand, and in many sections of the county 
these swales have been coated with a deposit of silt to such depth as 
to make them fine hay lands; this silt has been borne in solution 
from the higher lands and is occasioned by working too rapidly with 
a large volume of water, so that, usually, the farm lying next below 
is the one to receive the benefit of this increment. This must be 
avoided in the near future else very serious detriment will be sus- 
tained by the best grain lands in the county. 

An unused source of idle capital exists in Gallatin county, in the 
surplus waters of the West Gallatin. There are large areas of un- 
tilled lands, mainly owned by the Northern Pacific railway, near the 
center of the county to which this water is readily transferable, and 
once this is under cultivation and irrigation, a notable improvement 
in crop production will be experienced. 

The most reliable water rights in the county are those drawn 
from this stream, and that they are so, is from the unappropriated 
water therein. There are no grave engineering obstacles to be over- 
come in such transference, but the proposition is too large for the 
individual, or even the usual neighborhood corporation which has 
accomplished so far nearly all that has been done in this valley along 
the line of irrigation. 

GRANITE COUNTY. 

Granite county contains about 1,000,000 acres of land. To only a 
tenth part of this, however, has titles been acquired. The county is 
among the most mountainous in the state, there being but three valleys 
of considerable size, Flint, Willow and Hellgate. Hay crops are the 
leading farm products. Its mineral products are the leading sources 
of wealth. The output for 1899 was about $3,000,000, mainly from the 
Granite Mountain mine and the Bimetallic, both located at Granite. 
These are silver properties and are paying under extremely adverse 
conditions. That such an amount of tangible wealth is added from 
the resources of a single county under existing conditions, is re- 
markable and should call the attention to the possibilities of the better 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 63 

development of the farming region tributary to the mines. Much 
of the western part of the county lies toward the Pacific slope, with 
attendant mildness of climate. 

Early settlers looked alone to the values of the low-lying valleys 
immediately bordering the streams as sites for houses and farms, 
for it is in such cases possible to conduct water out of the streams onto 
the bottom lands by individual effort at a nominal expense. These 
represent by no means the utmost possibilities of farming. Any tract 
of country lying as does Granite in the heart of the mountains has 
many available reservoir sites, where flood waters may be safely and 
economically stored far up above the natural level of the streams; 
again these sites will command extensive areas of open bench and 
park lands, usually ,the richest and most durable of all soils. These 
can be safely put to cultivation to the cereals and forage crops, as well 
as to orchards. These elevated sites are not frosty and will prove 
to be extremely valuable for farming purposes. A trip to Vermont or 
New Hampshire would show the possibilities of these upland plateaus 
if opened up and farmed. 

Winter grain crops will be found to be very valuable to the farmer 
of the highlands, and one year with another a fine crop can be grown 
without irrigation. Rye and wheat succeed remarkably well, and winter 
wheat grown in Montana without irrigation is very different in milling 
character from the soft wheat of the humid states. 

It is hard for a novice to understand that a mining claim, usually 
about 600 by 1,500 feet, is but a huge factory, save that its armies of 
laborers are employed in shafts, corridors, chambers and levels under- 
ground, instead of being at work on the surface, within walls of brick 
and stone; also that relatively, much more help must be employed than 
in the ordinary factory, that wages are from 50 to 100 per cent higher 
and the recipients of the daily wages are in much better condition to 
be liberal patronizers of the producer. These are cogent reasons why 
the outcome of the mineralized mountain state will in the future be 
relatively immense, as compared with that state whose home market 
is based on a poorly paid constituency. 

JEFFERSON COUNTY. 

.Jefferson county receives its name from the Jefferson river on its 
southern boundary; this, while one of the main sources of the Mis- 
souri river, is the shortest principal river, probably, in the United 
States, as it is, all told, less than one hundred miles in length. 

Jefferson is one of the mountainous counties, very broken and 
hilly, with but two principal valleys— the Big Prickly Pear and North 
Boulder. These streams rise about the central part of the county, the 
one flowing north to the Missouri river and the other south to the 
Jefferson. 

The area of farm lands is consequently limited, there being of 
the million acres in this county only about 25,000 acres to which title 
has been secured. With the establishment of reservoirs, or a high 
line canal, tapping the Jefferson in Madison county, a large area of 
land could be brought under cultivation, lying in the vicinity of White- 



64 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

hall on the north bank of the Jefferson river. This will eventually be 
done and a choice body of farm lands thus opened. 

Grazing lands are extensive and many cattle herds of from 300 
to 500 head are reared and ranged in the county. As a rule, the south, 
hillsides are bare of timber and offer fine pasturage for cattle and 
horses. A peculiarity noticed in this state, especially the mountainous, 
sections, is the agility manifested by live stock in traversing the steep 
mountain sides in search of food. One oftentimes sees live stock 
grazing in comfort on hillsides, apparently inaccessible to any creature 
that does not vv^ear wings. 

Study the face of the precipitous slopes and it will be observed 
that they are paralleled in all directions by trails made, no doubt 
originally by the wild herds, and now used by cattle and horses. It 
would be a physical impossibility to coax or drive a state's animal 
into many of these locations. It is a matter of education and brings 
into valuable use a large proportion of grazing lands that otherwise 
would be unavailable. 

The farm lands of this county, though limited, are exceedingly 
productive. All cereals thrive and yield satisfactorily, while alfalfa,, 
clover and timothy succeed well. All leading root crops are also, 
profitably grown. 

The leading industry of this county is mining, and always will be. 
The value of the mineral output in 1899 was $1,500,000. 

The county seat, Boulder, is the site of the Deaf and Dumb asylum,, 
while near by is a famous, highly improved health resort, Boulder Hot 
Springs; on the southern side of the county are Pipe Stone Hot Springs^ 
These possess high medicinal qualities, largely supported by guests 
from Butte. There are also valuable medicinal springs at Alhambra, 
near the north central part of the county, much frequented by citizens 
of Helena. 

LEWIvS AND CLARK COUNTY. 

This county is historic ground.-: The city of Helena, the capital of 
the state and the county seat of the county, is located on the third 
largest and most productive placer camp of the state. "Last Chance,"" 
"Alder Gulch" of Madison county, and "Confederate Gulch" of Broad- 
water county, being relatively the first and second gold placer camps in 
Importance. 

Helena is the center of the live stock interests of the state, many 
of the owners of the large flocks and herds being residents here. It has 
railway connections with east and v/est, north and south lines; situated 
fourteen miles from the Missouri river, it has electric connections there- 
with, a dam costing more than a million of dollars supplying the gen- 
erating power. This supplies power for street car lines, light and heat- 
ing, as well as mechanical power, and is also the power used in the 
extensive smelting plant of the United States Refining & Smelting Co. 
of East Helena, six miles distant. 

The county is named for the commanders of the United States 
government overland expedition, which passed from St. Louis to the 
Pacific ocean in 1803-1805. In passing westward they used the Mis- 



BULLETIN NO. 26. G5 

souri river as their route, while on their return a part of the expedi- 
tion crossed the Rocky mountains about midv/ay of the county, over 
a pass known as "Lewis and Clark Pass." 

This county is the financial center of the state, and Helena prior 
to the panic of '93 was universally known as the richest city of the 
United States. 

It is still extremely wealthy, and is making rapid strides toward 
its former broad financial position. 

Three hundred and fifty thousand acres of the million and a half 
•acres constituting the area of Lewis and Clark has been proved up 
and become assessable land. Much of this is grazing land, and a large 
part is farmed by irrigation. There is a vast quantity of available 
water for irrigation, but to get the full use and benefit there will be 
great expense involved in conducting the water of the Madison river 
one hundred miles or more to the valley of the Big Prickly Pear. 
These lands are finely adapted to agriculture and will eventually be 
irrigated and tilled. Once the earnest attention of capitalists is 
drawn to the future agricultural possibilities of Montana under irriga- 
tion the state will receive a mighty impetus from the development 
of her arid lands. In no state in the Union is there such a present low 
value placed on farm lands. It is estimated on reliable authority 
that there is water in Montana streams adequate to the irrigation of 
75,000 quarter section farms, and a water right in Southern California 
tor 160 acres has a value of $15,000. On this basis the water 
of Montana is worth one billion one hundred and twenty-five million 
dollars. Equally reliable data places the application of water to the 
lands of the state (12,000,000 acres) at a trifle less than $100,000,000, 
•or about $7 per acre. In other words, at an expense of $1,120 the 
Montanan secures a water right worth to the Californian $15,000. 

Nature has indeed been kind to the Montanan in placing within 
Tiis reach a natural heritage of such inestimable value. But it may 
be said the Californian will use his land and water in the production 
of crops that will afford this heavy outlay. "We answer this: The 
Gallatin county farmer has repeatedly harvested crops that have been 
sold for $30 per acre gross, and we submit that a crop that will yield 
a gross income of $4,800 per annum can afford to pay interest upon a 
fixed investment of $15,000 and still be profitable to the owner. 

I'le farm irrigated lands of California. Utah, Colorado and Wyom- 
ing have a fixed tangible value of about $100 per acre, and the land 
owner of Montana has a reasonable right to consider that if his lands 
are equally productive and the supply of water as reliable, that once 
this is understood, that his lands will command quite as high a price 
as do other irrigable lands. 

Lewis and Clark will take high rank as an agricultural county. 
The soil and climate are adapted to the productive yield of the or- 
dinary fruit crops, cereals, root crops and the great labor centers of 
Helena, East Helena, the military fort at Fort Harrison and the 
mining camps will insure a good market. 

Lewis and Clark mining output for '99 was a million and a 
hKlf dollars, principally gold. 



66 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

The Broadwater Natatorium is a remarkable structure. Hot 
water is conducted in underground pipes for several miles and is 
emptied into the Ir^rgest artificial plunge in the world, more than 
100x300 feet. This is inclosed in a very striking building of Moorish 
architecture and is an ideal bathing plant. The plunge and hotel in 
connection cost about a half million dollars, and are situated in a de- 
lightful spot. 

Nearly half of the total area of the county is included in y/hat 
is known as the Lewis and Clark forest reserve. This reserve will 
have but little effect upon the lands of this county, in the way of insuring 
protecting cover to the winter snows, but it will be of inestimable 
value to the farm lands of the adjoining counties of Teton and Cas- 
cade, and eventually it will be very valuable to Lewis and Clark in 
that strict government supervision will be exercised in harvesting 
the standing timber, and in guarding from the ravages of fire. 

MADISON COUNTY. 

The nucleus for permanent occupation of this county was made 
in days when Montana was not, and this present state was a part of 
Idaho. 

The golden sands of Alder gulch, a little tributary of what was 
then known by the euphonious name of "Stinking Water," now as the 
"Ruby," was the attraction and it is said that there was a community 
of 10,000 souls strung out along a space of three to four miles in 
length, the gulch being a very narrow one. The city was housed in 
rude shacks and tents and eventually the towns of Nevada City and 
Virginia City were founded; the former has no longer even a post- 
ofiice, the inhabitants still there, going to Virginia City, two miles 
up stream for their mail. 

Virginia City is noted as being the first place in the state where 
the law and order party was able to make a stand aganst the era of 
bloodshed and robbery then so flagrantly common. It is estimated 
that $100,000,000 in gold dust was taken out of Alder gulch, and that 
the revenue from the old placers has been in recent years over $100,000 
per annum. This is principally obtained from ground overlooked or 
considered too poor to warrant working at the then high prevailing 
rates for labor and supplies. In those halcyon days all supplies came 
into the country from Utah and men could not afford to leave their 
golden harvest to indulge in prosaic farming. 

Year by year the farmer and truck grower, the cowboy and the 
shepherd have taken the place of the miner, until today the farm 
lands readily susceptible of irrigation have been taken up and made 
productive. 

Of the 2,000,000 acres constituting her domain, more than ten 
per cent, about 350,000 acres, are owned by individuals. This indi- 
cates that there are extensive tracts of arable and grazing lands within 
her borders, and would represent 2,125 farms of 160 acres each. 

Madison has a high altitude of from 4,000 to 6,000 feet, but never- 
theless the scope of farm productions is extensive, embracing all the 
common cereals, root crops, the various forage plants, alfalfa, that 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 67 



most wonderful of all the grasses is in all its glory here), and large 
areas are sown to alfalfa to be converted into beef and mutton. That 
alfalfa does so well on the wind-swept benches lying from fifteen to 
thirty feet above sub-water is that the tremendously deep-rooting 
system of this plant finds its way through all intervening strata of soil, 
gravel, sand, loam, clay, etc., to the permanent water table, from 
whence the moisture supply is pumped up to the crowns and stems, 
therefore the older the alfalfa meadow, the less water it requires, 
from surface irrigation. Consequently, the man with a well-established 
alfalfa field will each year require to apply less and less water, and 
the surplus will be available for other lands and crops. It was in 
Madison county that the discovery was made that the native forage 
plants do not alone possess the property of laying up their generous 
store of succulence and nutriment in the sun-dried plant, but that 
the alfalfa plant, permitted to stand uncut until winter, has rare fat- 
tening qualities. This policy is not advised, but there may be condi- 
tions where it will be of value, notably where alfalfa is self-sown in 
sage brush land, so as to preclude harvesting by ordinary means. lu 
the northern part of this county there is an extensive scope of open 
bench land lying between the south Boulder range and the Jefferson 
river that is an ideal region for the orchardist and truck gardener. 
The soil is a warm, sandy loam, the protection from the eastern sun 
is perfect and the physical formation of the country is such that the 
canyon breezes, working always from the higher to the lower levels 
after sundown and reversing the direction after sun up ward off the- 
danger to vegetation from frosts. In this locality tomatoes and melons 
are ripened, while standard apples, grapes, plums, cherries and all 
the small fruits do grandly. 

The county has a mineral production of three-fourths of a million 
dollars a year, and this is a wonderful stimulus to agriculture, as 
miners must eat, and their larders always contain the best that is ta 
be had for money. The proximity to Butte, together with good rail- 
way systems and good wagon roads across the mountains, open 
up a vast trade with this great hive of human workers. 

Madison has a great agricultural and horticultural future ahead of 
it, and opportunities are as abundant and promising here as in any 
other part of the state. 

MEAGHER COUNTY. 

Meagher county, divides with Fergus county, the honor of being 
the geographical central county of the state, and has long been 
recognized as one of the leading grazing counties. Its western bound- 
ary is formed by the Big Belt mountains, the leading outlying spur 
or range from the main range of the Rockies, which it parallels; its 
northern boundary is largely formed by the Little Belts; while the 
Elk mountains, an isolated smaller range, almost in the center of the 
county and the Crazy mountains, which lie to the southern line, give 
to the general plane of the country a broken surface, abounding in 
foot hills and small, attractive, fertile valleys leading therefrom which, 
make ideal home sites. Meagher county was originally settled by 



68 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



miners, there having been within its original boundaries one of the 
most famous of all the famous placer gulches of Montana, Confederate 
gulch, from which gold dust and nuggests were taken by the six-mule 
load, the winter work of four men. So successful were the settlers of 
this valley, first in mining, next in stock growing, that a recent census 
of the county showed a per capita wealth of every adult male of $4,400. 
Much of this enormous aggregation of wealth is due to the fact that it 
is a physical impossibilty for the farmers and ranchmen to produce 
grain for sale, as until within two years, much of the county (the val- 
leys of Smith and the Musselshell rivers), was from 45 to 75 miles from 
the railway. As a consequence they have marketed their grain on foot, 
that most successful method, by feeding sheep and cattle. 

The county seat, "White Sulphur Springs, has an elevation of al- 
most 5,000 feet and derives its name from hot springs located there, 
which are widely and favorably known for their curative properties. 

White Sulphur Springs is a jewel spot upon nature's fair face. 
Thirteen warm springs, dotted over an area of perhaps two acres in 
extent, boil forth at varying temperature. Much has been said and 
written, and we believe most truthfully, of the notable cures that have 
been effected by these waters. A most singular and interesting fact 
is, that these sulphur springs were extensively patronized by the In- 
dians for centuries before the advent of the white man, as well as 
since his possession of the land. The great feed grounds of the buf- 
falo extended orginally from the point of intersection of the main 
range with British Columbia, one-fourth of the way from the west 
to the east boundary, extending southeast from this point to a point 
a third of the way distant from the eastern boundary of the state to 
the western. Three-fifths of this vast state was at one time range for 
1;he buffalo, the elk, antelope and deer. Many Indian tribes resided in 
the mountain valleys in the western and northwestern parts of the 
state, cut off from communication with the east side by the 
mighty natural barriers of the main range of the Rockies and 
to get over these and into the general hunting ground, the 
various natural passes were used. One of the most common 
of thefee was that known as the Flathead pass, leading out of 
the northeastern corner of Gallatin valley, near its eastern part, over 
and into the valley of the Musselshell, which in turn flowed hundreds 
of miles through this natural game park into the Missouri. Not far 
from the headwaters of the Musselshell lie the White Sulphur springs, 
and the Indians of the tribes of Flatheads, Jockos, Nez Perces and 
others, oftentimes at war with each other, tiring of their almost ex- 
clusive fish and berry diet, would plan a summer excursion down into 
the game region, and tepees and contents, warriors, bucks, women, 
papooses, dogs and ponies would move in a long caravan down to the 
open plains country. Invariably they would plan both coming and 
going to stop some days or weeks at these wonderful springs to give 
their invalids a chance to be cured of the diseases to which they are 
so subject. The Indian (in blanket and moccasin) suffers greatly 
from exposure. The skin or canvas tepees are neither conducive to 
good health nor cleanliness, they are very liable to disease and the 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 69- 



need of r. sanitarium for tlie afflicted was so great that by common 
usage the camping grounds around White Sulphur Springs were neutral 
ground. 

Old-timers tell us that here, camped in close proximity, would be 
found in peaceful possession and enjoyment of the great medicine 
waters, tribes and parties which away from there would cut each 
others' throats without the least compunction. Two points are im- 
pressive in this connection; first, the value of the waters medicinally 
secured; second, the inherent right to enjoy undisturbed this valuable 
boon of the Great Spirit, the curative waters. 

A valuable lesson is given to other corporations by this little, thriv- 
ing mountain village, by its ownership of its system of water works, 
the only instance of the kind in the state where a town has con- 
s'tructed and owned its own plant. 

The leading agricultural valleys, in which more than a half-million 
acres of land are now under cultivation, are Smith river and the 
Musselshell. One peculiarity of Smith valley is that the stream has 
two names, from its head, some fifteen miles south of White Sulphur 
Springs, to the point of egress from the Canyon of the Little Belt 
mountains, a distance of perhaps fifty miles, it is known as Smith 
river, below this point to its mouth, opposite Cascade on the Missouri 
river, it is called Deep creek, a seeming perversion of ordinary 
geographical rules of nomenclature, as creeks are supposed to form 
rivers and not vice versa. This stream is a leading tributary 
to the Missouri. From the south side substantially all the waters of 
Smith river are appropriated and used between its head and the mouth 
of the first canyon, some twenty-five miles north of White Sulphur 
Springs, it being no infrequent occurrence in seasons more than normal- 
ly dry for the bed of the stream to be dry. No doubt a great aid to a 
better water supply could be experienced were the side gulches leading 
from the mountains to the rivers reservoired, thus holding in reserve 
the surplus waters v/hich now pass off in spring floods: doubtless there 
too are many locations along this stream where it would be found 
practical to cross section the bed of the stream from rim I'ock to bed 
rock with a trench in which a dam could be constructed of stone and 
cement, which would bring to the surface and permit to be used, the 
large underground flow which passes off and out of the county in the 
deep strata of gravel and boulders which fill this section from the 
upper surface of the bed of the stream to the lower levels on bed rock. 

This has never been undertaken in Montana to our knowledge, 
and, while it might not prove to be practical, yet there is no better 
field for such an experiment than is to be found in this valley. 

This valley is among one of the highest in the state, and there 
is some question as to the success of certain of the cereals which thrive 
so remarkably well in the lower lying valleys of the state. The 
principal crops grown are timothy and alfalfa for forage plants, the 
latter being the leading crop of the county, while the culture of alfalfa 
is just beginning with most gratifying results, and the promise of 
giving at least two No. 1 crops annually. Red top and blue joint also- 
do well; oats is the leading crop in the cereals, there being no local 
market for wheat and barley; potatoes do well, except at rare in- 
tervals. 



70 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



The hardier apples and crabs are successfully grown and in no part 
of the state do the small fruits succeed better. The recent construc- 
tion of the Montana railroad from the Northern Pacific rail- 
way, at the mouth of Sixteen-Mile creek, to the near vicinity of the 
famous silver and lead mining camp of Castle, has given a new im- 
petus to agriculture, and it is confidently expected that in the near 
future this remarkable mining camp will be alive with its old-time 
vigor. 

Perhaps eighteen miles east of Castle, the river passes away from 
the environment of the Little Belt mountains, which form its northern 
watershed Into a broad, open, rolling country (very favorable to stock 
'grazing) on to the valley proper, which is capable of irrigation, 
where it broadens and thus renders it possible to farm large tracts 
of land, now used solely for grazing. These two valleys form a 
natural route for a railway, and with such a potent factor in the 
development of any country, rapid strides will be made in farm pros- 
perity. 

MISSOULA COUNTY. 

This is a border county of Montana; its western boundary, the 
Bitter Root mountains, separating Montana from Idaho. It is one of 
the well watered counties of the state; flowing through it from east 
to west is the Missoula river, formed- near its eastern boundary by the 
union of the Big Blackfoot and the Hellgate rivers, which unite later 
with the Bitter Root coming in from the south. 

The valley of the Missoula proper, extends perhaps 200 miles 
across the county, and this, with the valley of the Bitter Root, is the 
ideal fruit section of the Rocky mountain region. 

The mean altitude of Missoula county is 2,300 feet, and paralleled 
as it is by the Bitter Root range on the west and the main chain 
•of the Rockies to the east, the conditions are most favorable for 
■climatic conditions, exactly adapted to fruit culture. The soil is quite 
large granitic, and while lacking the strength of, the heavy clay 
soils found east of the mountains; it is free of alkali, and seems to 
he exactly adapted to the growth of trees and fruit. Wheat, oats and 
barley are leading crops, also the grasses and clovers, while there 
is no section of the state in which root crops succeed better. Spring 
arrives from two to four weeks earlier than in the eastern and central 
parts of Montana, and the killing frosts are delayed for about an equal 
time. 

A considerable portion of the county is occupied by the reserve for 
the Flathead Indians. This in time will be thrown open to settlement 
and will render available one of the richest bodies of agricultural land 
in the West. 

Irrigation is quite extensively practiced. The average supply of 
water in the Bitter Root river for the past three years has been 8,784 
•cubic feet per second, equal to 350,000 miner's inches. This is un- 
employed water, and if judiciously applied to the lands would, under 
diversified farming, afford a supply for 700,000 acres of land. 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 71 



The lumber interests of Missoula county are extensive, and the 
saw mill plant of the Big Blackfoot Lumbering Co., on the Blackfoot, at 
Bonner, on the Northern Pacific Railway, is one of the most complete 
and extensive in the United States. 

There are also considerable mining interests in the county, and 
these are always valuable markets for agricultural products. Until the 
outbreak of the Spanish war, a regiment of United States regulars was 
stationed at Fort Missoula. These posts are valuable markets for 
farm produce and great promoters to business interests. Missoula, 
the county seat, is a divisional point of the Northern Pacific railway; 
it has an excellent public school system, is a most thriving residence 
city, and is the home of the State University. It is also the present 
head center for the small fruit trade of Montana, the growers of small 
fruits in the valley of the Bitter Root, of which strawberries and black- 
berries are as yet the leading products, find here energetic dealers and 
middle men who find good markets for these goods, at most remuner- 
ative prices to the fruit men. This industry is destined to be the lead- 
ing one of this section, and lands suitable to the culture of fruit are 
in active demand. 

These plantations will call for the use of large quantities of 
water for irrigation. The United States- government survey has 
maintained a gaging station in the Bitter Root, the Blackfoot and the 
Missoula; the work is supervised by Prof. Fred D. Smith of the State 
University. 

There are many public and private ditches in use in this county 
and many more are projected. 

PARK COUNTY. 

Park county, originally a part of Gallatin county, from which 
it is separated by the Gallatin range of mountains^ is named from 
its being the entrance to the Yellowstone National Park. This is one 
of the promising counties of the state, offering a vast range of pos- 
sibilities to the settler. The Yellowstone with a northern course, the 
Shields river with a southern trend, the latter a tributary of the for- 
mer, gives to the county a valley nearly 100 miles in length, which is 
well watered; the above named rivers and their tributaries giving 
opportunity for irrigation, advantage of which has been taken by the 
farmers who have taken the water from all the smaller streams and 
applied it to the fertile lands. 

Park county was the dead line for the predatory bands of Sioux 
Indians, who, for years prior to 1876, raided all the county to the east- 
ward. West of the Gallatin range of mountains, the country had 
been settled from the south and west and it was these settlers in turn 
who opened up the lower Yellowstone valley and drove the Indians 
back into the Dakotas. Following the Indians, came the cattle and 
horsemen, and for years this was one of the great open ranges. These, 
in turn, are giving way to the farmers, who have discovered in the 
irrigable valleys mighty possibilities in cereal production. The Shields 
river valley is especially adapted to barley; it is productive, also, in 



72 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

hard fife wheat. Higher bench lands are ideal alfalfa areas and the 
foot hills to the Crazy and Gallatin range will eventually be vast 
winter wheat and rye fields. 

The future of fruit in this county is also very bright. Many experi- 
ment orchards have been set and are now in good bearing. 

A considerable revenue is received from the travel to the National 
Park. Passengers for the park leave the main line of the Northern 
Pacific at Livingston and proceed by a branch line to Cinnabar, from 
whence the trip is made by stage. This travel, already large, is rapidly 
increasing, and makes a good market for farm produce. 

Park county is very rich in precious minerals; there is great 
activity in opening up and preparing to conduct extensive mining 
operations. The output of 1899 was about $150,000. This will be vastly 
increased in the near future. 

Rapid progress in development is occurring in this county. The 
members of the Board of Trade of Livingston are an active, energetic 
corps of promoters of all legitimate enterprises, and Park county has 
a brilliant future ahead of it. 

RAVALLI COUNTY. 

Prior to 1893, the entire portion of Montana lying west of the 
main range (except the counties of Deer Lodge and Silver Bow) was 
known as Missoula county. From this stretch of country on the north 
was carved Flathead county; and on the south Ravalli county, leav- 
ing the present county between the two. Ravalli is under the 
average size of Montana counties, containing 4,012 square miles, but is 
large in agricultural and horticultural possibilities. Geographically 
it is well located, upon the west, the Bitter Root mountains, the 
loftiest among the high timbered ranges of the Rocky mountain 
system, together with the Rocky mountains proper in the east, the 
general course being nearly north and south, shut out and shelter the 
valley of the Bitter Root from the east and west winds, which are the 
ones most to be avoided in the mountainous regions. The Bitter 
Root, a beautiful, typical mountain stream, carries an abundance of 
water through the irrigation season, and fiows almost due north mid- 
way between these ranges, giving an average width of perhaps tv.'enty 
miles between the foot hills of either range. The prevailing winds 
are up or down stream, and with its naturally well sheltered position, 
and the equalizing influences of the air currents from the higher 
mountain plateaus to the lower valley levels, an ideal climate results, 
for agricultural possibilities. 

Ravalli county, or the Bitter Root valley proper, is rich \t\ his- 
toric memories. At old Fort Owen, whose adobe walls are still p' 'ir:!/ 
visible, in the near vicinity of Stevensville, are to be seen the 
first farmed areas in Montana. In 1396 there died on his farm near 
Stevensville Mr. Thomas Harris, who raised the first wheat and oats 
crops ever grown in Montana; this was in 1854. In the same neighbor- 
hood is also to be seen the first buildings of St. Mary's Mission, located 
here as being most accessible to the headquarters of the Flathead In- 
dians, whose first reservation v/as contiguous to Stevensville. 



74 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 

This has since been removed to St. Ignatius Mission some sixty 
miles north upon the present Indian reservation. 

Undoubte'dly the great christianizing influence of the fathers of 
this mission has had much to do with the molding of the character 
of the Platheads, and in making of them the best friends the whites 
have ever had among the Indians. Nearly forty years ago the Bass 
brothers of Stevensville began to work with fruit culture. Except for 
the phenomenally favorable local conditions for tree growth the ex- 
periment must have come to naught, as the first trees were brought 
from Salt Lake City by pack train, a distance of nearly 500 miles. 
The distance not being so much of an obstacle as was the length of 
time en route, and the necessity for transporting the tender trees in 
unprotected bundles. From this unfavorable start, orcharding has 
been persistently followed up in this valley until it is to-day the scene 
of the greatest commercial orchard activity in the United States. Here 
are located orchards of 500 acres and upward, and the valley in the 
near future is destined to be one vast orchard. The soil of the bench, 
lands on either side of the Bitter Root is of granitic origin; apparent- 
ly light and worthless, carrying many boulders and gravel in the 
disintegrated granite, but for the present at least the conditions are 
ideal for apple, cherry and plum culture. Remarkable success is 
also being experienced in peach and pear growing and small fruits- 
thrive in a remarkable manner. 

Three million pounds of fruit were shipped out of this valley in 
'98, and this is but the beginning, as this fruit was largely the first 
crop of the numerous young orchards which are just entering intO' 
bearing. This valley is fortunate in having interested the well known 
manager of the Anaconda Copper Co., Marcus Daly. He has acquired 
large areas of farm and ranch lands in the vicinity of Hamilton, the- 
county seat of Ravalli county, and is a most enthusiastic orchardist, 
setting orchards at the rate of 50,000 trees per annum. His efforts- 
will be seen not perhaps so much in the matter of cultivation as in 
the business foresight requisite to the successful marketing of such 
vast quantities of fruit. With his other extensive business connec- 
tions, in merchandizing and lumbering, he will open up the way to^ 
many Eastern markets which have been heretofore held and oc- 
cupied by the fruit of Washington and Oregon. 

Ravalli county has been the scene of great activity in irrigation; 
the many orchard and farm plants calling for an assured supply. 

SILVER BOW COUNTY. 

This county derives its name from a small stream of the same 
name and was so called by the early settlers, who, from the summits 
of the big butte, which gives the city its name, saw spread out before 
them on the fair landscape, a beautiful trout stream wimpling on 
toward the seas through grassy intervals. The natural course of the- 
stream suggested the shape of a bow (not the Indian bow), fash- 
ioned from a straight bit of wood or bone, but the more fanciful weapon 
of the archer, whose ends curve gracefully upward. The word silver 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 75 



was peculiarly appropriate as its waters shone silvery in the rich green 
setting of the lush meadows. Unfortunately for the sentimentalist^ 
the march of progress, as exemplified in copper mining, has changed 
all this. The beautiful pellucid stream has been robbed of its purity, 
every drop of its sparkling water has been taken from its bed and 
by devious and uncertain ways has been led up, into and through 
mighty concentraters, where it is made to play its part in dissolving 
obdurate stone and mineral, whence it finds its way back to its orig- 
inal bed as a turbid, thick, muddy, sediment-bearing torrent, scarcely 
worthy of the name water. Its natural bed is covered in places, ten, 
twenty and thirty feet deep, with disintegrated ore, rock and soil. So 
saturated is the water with sediment that it does not purify itself un- 
til passing Lake Pend d'Oreille, 300 miles to the westward. 

Silver Bow county produces more mineral values than any other 
county in the United States. The output for 1899 was $55,000,000. 
Of this, gold was $1,500,000; silver, $13,000,000; copper, $40,500,000. 

That the residents of Butte, the capital of the county, and the site 
of the greatest mining activity in the world, are proud of their title, 
"The greatest mining camp on earth," is easily understood whea 
it is remembered that it has a record of a production of $500,000,000 
since its establishment. 

Butte has 65,000 busy inhabitants, and is a fitting complement ta 
the productive agricultural acres of Montana. Agriculture is almost 
unknown within the confines of the county. A small amount of hay 
is harvested, principally blue joint, and timothy (the former a native 
product), and a few dairy cows are pastured. It is interesting to know 
that the mines do not trespass to any considerable extent upon the 
agricultural lands. As this enormous amount of wealth has been dug 
out of an area scarcely two miles square, it is difficult to discover 
any possibility of agriculture of this county in the immediate vicinity 
of these mighty smelters, as the smoke belched from their massive 
chimneys carries with it such a volume of destructive gaseous matter 
that vegetation exposed to its fumes cannot survive. This is true 
of trees and plants. One of the legumes (sweet clover) seems to re- 
sist the bad influences. This clover also stands well in alkali per- 
meated soil. This peculiarity would make it a valuable plant, did it 
possess value originally. 

Butte is the clearing house for Montana farm products, and 
draws heavily, not only on Montana, but on the neighboring states as 
well. The fact that gardening in all its simpler forms is practically 
unknown and that all the staples of life require to be produced else- 
where, offers rare opportunities to those who are more favorably 
situated for such truck crop production. 

That Butte City and Silver Bow county indicate permanency, is icy 
be seen in the constantly increasing output of ore and the remarkable 
increase in population. It has practically doubled itself in three years 
and has every promise of being a continued producer. 

The valley of the Big Hole, or Wisdom river, in the southern part 
of the county, is a fine grazing country and offers superior advantages 
to stock raisers. 

The main portion of the county is mountainous and will alwaya 
find its greater values in the business of mining. 



■76 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



SWEET GRASS COUNTY. 

This is one of tlie last legislative creations and is a grand county 
from the standpoint of the farmer and herdsman. It is bisected almost 
equally on east and west lines by the Yellowstone river, which flows 
a little south of east in its general course. Prominent tributaries 
to the Yellowstone from the north are Big Timber and Sweet Grass 
creeks, while, from the south, the Boulder and Stillwater enter. There 
is in addition a dozen or more smaller creeks entering the Yellow- 
stone, while there are numerous tributaries to the above four larger 
streams. Then on the north side of the county many small streams 
find their way northward to the Musselshell river. The prevalence of 
these streams means much to the section, as to the initiated it always 
means an easy way to secure precious water for irrigation. Once 
free of the near vicinity of the mountains along these streams, we are 
reasonably safe in expecting to find a fairly generous margin of bottom 
land fringing the streams and consequently easy prospects for con- 
ducting the water out of the streams and on to the land. 

Sweet Grass is happily named, as it has long been a favored 
range, not only for cattle owners and horsemen, but for the shepherd 
as well. A half million of its two million acres have been appropriated 
and settled, and it is fast coming to the front as a fruit, agricultural 
and stock-growing counti-y- 

The first lands to be reclaimed within the state, under the pro- 
vision of the Carey Arid Land Act, whereby Montana was given a 
million acres of land, conditioned on putting water thereon, are 
located in Sweet Grass county, and it is expected that ere long the 
principal part of this vast body of land will be brought under irriga- 
tion, and that settlement will speedily inure. The northwestern part 
of the county is broken by the Crazy mountains, but the presence of 
mountains always adds value to the land in the near proximity, as 
mountains usually insure an abundant supply of water in the irrigating 
season from the many streams heading therein; and fed by the snow 
banks and drifts that lie for months in their high altitude, untouched 
by the rays of the sun, long after the snow has disappeared from 
the low lands and the foot hills. Then, too, mountains usually mean 
timber and this has always been available; without money and with- 
out price to the Montana settler, supplying him with material for 
fencing, houses, barns, etc., as well as fuel. Free timber is a great 
boon to the settler in the mountain regions. 

In no other part of the state does alfalfa do so well as in Sweet 
Grass. Three and four crops are cut annually. 

A peculiar formation of country is found along the Boulder. The 
stream is named, no doubt, from the great abundance of boulders 
that are strewn not only on the surface, but form more than half of 
the soil or strata from the grass roots to bed rock. Much of this is 
so stony as to be hard to break up. The discovery has been made 
that by gathering the stones from the surface, then disking well 
in early spring while the surface is soft from spring rains and seed- 
ing on this scarified native sod, that alfalfa will do splendidly well. 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 77' 



The only help it needs in its new environment is an abundance of 
water. Were one to see a cross section of this land in which the 
finest alfalfa grows, it would surprise him that anything could possibly 
live, much less thrive in such an environment, as from thirty to fifty 
feet in depth the cross section shows boulders varying in size from 
a hen's egg to a bushel basket, sand, gravel, clay and very little loam, 
the whole cemented together into an actual conglomerate, which, when 
quarried out, appears to be bound together into an apparently indis- 
soluble mass. How the roots of any plant can thrust themselves down 
ten, twenty and even thirty feet into such an unkind, unpromising en- 
vironment passes the comprehension of man. Strange as it may seem, 
it appears to be a habitat in which alfalfa is at home. 

Fruits (hardy in nature), such as standard apples, crabs, pears, 
cherries and plums, are doing well where judiciously planted and 
intelligently cultivated, while small fruits succeed beyond expecta- 
tion. 

Game and fish are abundant. There will be a marked influx of 
settlers into this part of the state in the near future. 

It is expected that 5,000,000' pounds of wool, worth $1,000,000, 
will be marketed in Big Timber in 1900. 

TETON COUNTY. 

Teton is a border county. British possessions form more than: 
one hundred miles of its northern boundary; its western boundary 
is a part of the Rocky mountain range, and considerably more than 
half of its area covered by the Lewis and Clark and Flathead forest 
i-eservations and by the Blackfoot Indian reservation. These re- 
serves do not affect, to any appreciable extent, the agricultural lands 
of the county, as these are mainly in the southeastern part. 

The Great Northern railway traverses the county from east to 
west, while the Great Falls and Canada railway crosses the eastern 
part of the county from north to south. 

It by no means follows that because Teton lies so far to the 
north that it is inhospitably cold. The three counties that span east- 
ern Montana, east of the range, the north tier of counties, are practi- 
cally the only counties where open winter stock grazing is practiced. 
The winds prevail here in winter and the newly-fallen snow is swept 
into coulees and draws, leaving the well-grassed plateaus exposed, 
so that stock can feed the major part of the winter. These counties 
are susceptible to chinook winds, which also afford relief to the winter 
months. There is a large settlement of Minnesota farmers in the 
southeastern part of the state near Choteau, and these are in love 
with the producing capacity of the land under irrigation. Barley as 
fine in quality as the Gallatin barley is grown there, and wheat, oats 
and root crops are unexcelled both as to quality and quantity. 

Small fruits do well, and in some locations the hardy apples and 
crabs are succeeding well. 

Water for irrigation is quite abundant in the southeastern part 
of the county and is easily diverted from the streams to the farm 
lands; the surface of the county is favorable for irrigation, as it is 



78 



MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



not so broken and cut by coulees as in country in the nearer vicinity 
of the larger streams. 

The natural market of this part of the state is Great Falls. This 
lively town of 15,000 souls makes a heavy demand upon the farmers 
lor food for its army of workers, busy in the great smelters. 

Teton county has 5,000,000 acres of land within its borders and 
•only three per cent of this has been claimed. It is true that the forest 
and Indian reserves occupy, perhaps, 2,500,000 acres, but there is 
still remaining to the settler a vast number of good homesteads. Un- 
questionably, it will be found that much of the western part of the 
•county, along the foot hills with northern exposures will be available 
for winter grain lands, susceptible of production without irrigation. 

The prospective Oriental trade, for which the Great Northern is 
making extensive preparations in cutting down its grades and pro- 
viding a fleet of ocean carriers, will supply a good grain market to 
all the coimtry tributary to its line. 

It will not be long until the great Blackfoot reservation will be 
reduced in size by opening it up to settlement, and the southeastern 
part to be thrown open to settlers. These Indians will eventually be 
self-supporting; they are acquiring extensive bands of cattle, horses 
and sheep, and have done considerable in the way of farming. 

VALLEY COUNTY. 

This county is the northeast county of the state. Its southern 
Tjoundary across two-thirds of the country is the Lower Missouri river, 
whose principal tributaries are from the north. Lower Milk river with 
its half-dozen tributaries, form an agricultural valley of itself), Por- 




IN THE MILK RIVER VALLEY, RAISED UNDER IRRIGATION. 

cupine creek, Poplar river. Big and Little Muddy rivers and numer- 
ous smaller confluents, with their fertile bottom lands offer many desir- 
able home locations where crops can be gi'own under irrigation. 



BULLETIN NO. 26. 79 



It is douDtful If the waters from the Missouri river can ever be 
•taken from its deeply cut channel onto lands in successful irrigation 
work; and but little has been done as yet to promote agriculture in 
Valley county. Perhaps a fourth of the county is composed of the 
Fort Peck Indian Reservation, lying along the north side of the Mis- 
souri river and extending back therefrom about fifty miles. Within 
the reservation is much area susceptible of irrigation, and the Indians 
under efficient management are doing some advanced farming. Other 
most desirable farming areas are to be found along the Milk river and 
its tributaries, Assiniboine, Woody Island, Cottonwood, White, French- 
man's, Little Rocky and Porcupine creeks. 

This county has but little fall compared with other sections of 
Montana. Milk and its tributaries are shallow banked streams, and 
water is very easily taken out onto the adjacent territory. 

There is no more productive lands than are to be here found; 
there are abundant beds of lignite coal, offering a cheap and reasonably 
satisfactory fuel supply; splendid yields of barley, wheat and oats are 
"being grown wherever sown, and in forage plants the product is 
marvelous. • 

YELLOWSTONE COUNTY. 

This county was named for the river of the same name, which 
forms its southern boundary; Musselshell forms the northern boundary. 
The county lies nearly midway of the state, east and west; the Crow 
Reservation and Carbon county being between it and Wyoming. The 
•county seat is Billings, named after Mr. Frederick S. Billings, former 
president of the Northern Pacific railway. Mr. Billings made large in- 
vestments in lands in Yellowstone county about the time of the pro- 
.jeetion of the Northern Pacific railway through the state. 

During his life he was a firm believer in the agricultural possi- 
bilities of this region, which opinion has been maintained by his rep- 
resentatives, who have handled the Billings estate always with the idea 
that the future for agriculture of the contiguous territory was bound 
to be most promising. While removed far enough from the mountains 
to have but little waste land it is sufficiently near to possess that de- 
cree of fall which permits water being taken from the Yellowstone 
river for purposes of irrigation at a reasonable expense. 

In Yellov.'stone county are to be found the oldest alfalfa fields in 
the state, there being one forty-acre field on which alfalfa has been 
Taarvested for fourteen consecutive seasons, there having been added 
to the original field sufficient to embrace a tract of 300 acres. It is 
an ideal stock country, but the stockmen have not been permitted un- 
disturbed possession thereof. Wherever water could be transferred 
to the bench lands they have been fenced, ditched, and either sown to 
alfalfa or else continued in the product i5f the native blue joint hay, 
which, perhaps, all things considered, is the ideal horse forage plant of 
the West. 

Farmers of this county have been most successful in reaching the 
markets of Butte, Helena, and the Yellowstone National Park with 
hay products. Time nor opportunity have not been afforded the Ex- 
periment Station to investigate the effects of continued cultivation of 



80 MONTANA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



the soil to blue jo'int. It is not expected, however, that it will prove 
to be very exhaustive to land. As a rule it does not maintain under 
continued cultivation and harvesting, the ability to produce the normal- 
ly heavy hay crops that are usually harvested from blue joint fields 
when first put under irrigation and harvesting. This is owing, no 
(^'.oubt, in part to the grass not being permitted to re-seed itself, as 
quite frequently occurs in its wild state. 

The custom, however, in Yellowstone has been to maintain the 
land in blue joint so long as from three-fourths to one ton per acre 
could be cut, then to break up and sow to grain, following this by 
seeding to alfalfa. In the vicinity of Billings are to be found large 
sheep feeding interests. Many bands of sheep are run during the sum- 
mer upon high lands lying between the two rivers along the base of the 
mountains to the west and south and during the winter these bands 
are moved to winter ranges, where the grass has been permitted 
to grow undisturbed through the summer, with the expectation 
of it furnishing ample winter food for the bands, supplementing this, 
in case of heavy snow, with a sufficient supply of alfalfa to tide the 
sheep over the short periods in which it is impossible for them to 
find their own food. From these bands are usually purchased from 
100,000 to 250,000 lambs, which are fed exclusively on alfalfa hay, for 
a period of from thirty-five to forty days, when they are found to be 
in fine condition for the Eastern market. It is needless to say that this 
practice is far more beneficial than is that of shipping the hay out 
of the country, a process which will be quite as disastrous in the long 
run as that of exclusive grain growing. 

Yellowstone county is also becoming a favored point for steer 
feeding in the same general v/ay. It has been proved that young stock 
fed upon prime alfalfa hay in the mild wijiters of Montana form quite 
as good beef and mutton as do the live stock fed in the Mississippi 
valley, carried through on corn, eastern hay and corn stalk fields. 
The lack of grain in the Montana ration being more than compensated 
for by the very superior quality of Montana hay and the mildness of 
the winter through the feeding period. 

Very extensive irrigation projects have been successfully de- 
veloped within the boundaries of this county. Here, too, will be found 
some of the first work of the Montana arid land commission. 

The Northern Pacific Railway Co. have also formulated plans 
which will look to the reclamation of a tract of land, perhaps 30,000 
acres, lying within the borders of this county. 

The altitude of Yellowstone is a mean between the highest to the 
lowest lying valleys under cultivation in the state. 

Much attention has been given to the production of Indian corn, 
which is here, in favorable seasons, a very profitable crop. As high 
as ninety bushels per acre of ear corn, the finest quality of dent, have 
been produced, and well authenticated records of 1,200 bushels of Irish 
potatoes have been grown upon a single acre. Watermelons, field 
pumpkins, squash and tobacco are successfully raised, while most en- 
coui'aging results are being obtained from fruit culture. Both standard 
and crab apples, plums, pears and small fruits and grapes are succeed- 
ing admirably. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

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